Week #59

March 11, 2013

Hey family! 

Can you believe it??!! I have transfers again next WEEK! I can't believe how quickly this transfer is going by. The 5 week transfer has been incredibly speedy... It makes me nervous to think that next transfer I'll only have 2 left!! AH! But guess what? The missionary department sent us a letter telling us that we now can email any friends, priesthood leaders, and even recent converts and we'll now have 2 hours to email people!! :)  Super exciting, right?! It will make letter writing much easier, that's for sure... ha ha! 

So I'm super scatter-brained today from losing that one hour of sleep... Holy cow, ha ha! It seriously did some crazy things to me. This won't be my best letter... just fyi. 

Have I told you about the regular that comes to Temple Square, Bob? He's super hilarious and handicapped. He's had one of the hardest lives I've ever heard of, seriously. He's been hit by a car, he fell off a bridge, and he had to re-learn to talk.  His throat is actually partially paralyzed so listening to him speak is really hard to do. But he's the sweetest man ever and I just love him a lot!  One day we were talking and some sister brought up being on a diet. (Bob's very overweight from being handicapped). He turns to me and says, "Sister, I'm on the seafood diet. I see food and then I eat it!!" HA HA HA HA-- I absolutely died of laughter.  I thought dad would get a kick out of this since this is his humor. :) 

We had some miracles this week and some disappointments. We met a man on Temple Square named Richard.  He was so depressed, poor man. He really has no idea what his purpose is in this life and needs to know why he's here. We taught him the plan of Salvation and took him through God's plan (he has a wife and 3 kids), but he has a hard time believing that he and his family can truly be that happy. (I think he and his wife have some marital problems.) We set up another time to meet with him on Temple Square because he's only in town for a few days, but he didn't show up. :(  We gave him our number so hopefully he'll call us sometime soon. When we asked for his number, he said, "I don't think that would be a good idea.. I don't want to have to explain that one."  Super sad. I'm so grateful for the gospel in my life, especially what it has done for my family and the love and peace it brings to us. Hopefully he will accept the gospel some day. I know he definitely felt the spirit through our lesson. 

We also had another new investigator named Craig who is a very interesting man... He has some problems, but the Atonement is real and it can definitely change him. We also called the people from France today who referred and they are SUPER excited to meet with the missionaries!! Hopefully they'll call them sometime soon. We're going to call them on Wednesday and teach them. Woot! 

Altogether, it's been good and a difficult week as well. We've made it a goal to expect miracles this week as a companionship :) We've been so good about being obedient, trying to better ourselves as missionaries, but we've been giving a lot of service to our dear sisters which lessens the time we have for our own missionary work. But I know that the Lord has blessings awaiting us. We just have to keep trying, right? 

I loved your story about the Ludwig family.  That is seriously incredible!! What a huge miracle. The Lord truly loves his children, doesn't he? I think it is so incredible to think that through all of the difficulties our family has had to deal with, sometimes the difficulties have been the means of bringing other souls to Christ (or back to Him :)). I can't wait to be a member missionary when I get home!! I hope I'll be able to help my fellow brothers and sisters come unto Christ, now that I know how to be a member missionary! :) 

I have something for Brad to look up... in the Bible Dictionary.  It has a definition for UNICORN!!! HA HA HA HA! Did any of you know that Unicorn is in the Bible Dictionary??!! I about died of laughter. Personal study is so great sometimes. :) JK. . . some Sisters showed that to me. But speaking of Personal study, we had ours in front of the Christus this morning. :) It was so amazing! I loved it. I haven't had that good of a personal study in a long time. 

Well family, I love you all so much. Please pray for Sister Marand and I to find more people to teach... for some reason it has been difficult for us to do that lately. 

LOVES! 

Sister Nat 

Week #58

March 4, 2013

Hey fam!! 

Thanks for all of your wonderful emails. :) I always love hearing from you guys and how you're all doing. 

Yes, it was SO much fun to see Emily Anderson the other day!!! She looks so good. And it was her birthday, too!! I felt bad because we had an investigator lesson right then or else I would have loved to talk with them forever, ha ha! We were on exchanges as well, so she met Sister Labbe in our zone. 

Well, this was definitely a week of miracles followed by hardships. Always how it works, right? We took a French tour the other day that was so amazing. The two frenchies were with a member from Utah that was bringing them to Temple square so they could learn more about the church and feel the spirit. (I love that so much!!) It was a couple who have two kids, but their kids weren't with us. We first took them downstairs in the North Visitor Center to show them the display of all the prophets and the Book Of Mormons and teach them the Restoration. The lady, Sandra, was actually the sister-in-law of the member and had had questions about our church ever since her sister joined... which was 20 years ago!! So she's been asking them questions for years about it and when she came here to Temple Square, she totally felt the spirit and had even MORE questions. It reminded me a lot of Frank in that way! He had questions every time we would visit with him. I think that is a definite sign of the Spirit working with someone. Anyways, we then took them through God's Plan and at the end they agreed to meet with local missionaries!! So awesome!! People from France NEVER refer btw.... ever, just like Germans. And I've had both since I've been out ha ha! which is funny considering I've never had a German companion! :) The Lord has definitely blessed me a lot on my mission. It's amazing how prepared some of these people are that come on the square! 

So the key indicators of our mission are changing... they're FINALLY going to be exactly the same as a normal mission!! I'm excited for this. However, this will definitely bring the numbers down for the mission because we're not really counting any lessons that happen on the square, because you typically only count lessons with your investigators, not just guests on the square. We had to have a training for our zone yesterday to help them understand the new changes for the KI's which was good, but there's still a lot of questions about them. It's hard to get everyone (especially sisters from other countries) on the same page, ha ha! But it will be a really good change though. I think it will definitely help our sisters realize the importance of EVERY tour and EVERY contact we make. These are all potential investigators who need the gospel of Jesus Christ, so there's going to be a lot more focus on getting New Investigators on the square! :) woot! 

We have several different investigators that are progressing right now which is exciting, but we definitely need more new investigators. We're focusing a lot on asking everyone for referrals, whether they're a member or not, and trying our best to help people have that true conversion they need to have. 

So huge miracle of the week...  Elder Bretzke, my Zone Leader outbound, told me while I was out there that his sister was getting married March 2nd in the SLC temple, and that his ex-girlfriend/fiance was going to be a bridesmaid for the wedding. She is not a member of the church.  He really believed strongly that there was a reason why he and I met. She met with missionaries for a while and even read the Book Of Mormon. She has a lot of things that are holding her back from joining the church.  She believes that she got the answer that the church isn't for her. She's had lots of questions about polygamy, blacks not being able to hold the priesthood... she doesn't like things that are controversial, and doesn't really think that God is necessary for everyone. For her, He is, but it is almost like she believes that if people don't believe in God its okay. I'm not totally sure. Anyway, she's been reading the BOM since he's been out on his mission and hasn't really gotten a different answer about it, but she's planning on finishing it before he gets home. This was all stuff that Elder Bretzke told me before I left for SLC again. We both believed that there was a reason why he and I just happened to be in the same zone in Ontario, and definitely a possibility of me meeting her on Temple Square and helping her feel the spirit and understand the truth. Well... guess who I ran into on March 2nd!!! :) Actually, it was so cool because I got permission from the AP's to be out on the square for just a little bit longer that day so I could try to find her. Well I was super discouraged because we had a zone meeting at 12:00 and the wedding was at 12:20... and I thought for sure I might miss her. Well, there was a member after 1:00 pm that was walking around the temple trying to find the entrance to it, and Sister Marand and I decided to help her find the door. We walked her inside the waiting room and I suddenly hear, "Excuse me, are you Sister Savage?" I was so shocked, it took me a second to realize it was Carolyn that was asking me MY name, hah!! Apparently Elder Bretzke told his sister to tell Carolyn (and his younger sisters) to look for a blonde missionary named Sister Savage, but didn't explain why... ha ha! and then they found me! :) Super crazy. Carolyn and I talked for almost and hour about her experiences with the church, what she thinks of the Book Of Mormon, etc. It was such a good conversation. I know it definitely couldn't have been better, but I had been praying almost every day since I got back into SLC that I would know what to say to her. When we started talking about the BOM, I asked her why she was reading it. She told me that Elder Bretzke and her had talked about what religion they want to raise their kids in if they were to get married, which led to her meeting with the missionaries and stuff, and she then informed me about how she got her answer not to join the church. So I asked her what that answer was like, and she said, "Well, I just got the feeling that this church was really good, there was nothing necessarily wrong with it, but that I just needed to stick with the Bible for now." (I was thinking... wait a second, your first thought was that this church was really good. how is that a "no"?)  But she had only been reading the BOM a little bit, and I don't know if she was really sincerely seeking to find the answer or not. She was seeking for truth in her search to learn more about our church; she was looking more for education. So we started talking about the BOM and I told her pretty honestly that there are only 2 options with the BOM. It's either true, and it truly was translated by a prophet of God, or its completely false and all made up. I asked her, "Do you really believe that a man who was in his 20's made up a book like this?" She understood my point, but that wasn't really the missing piece... so I then opened up Moroni 10:4-5. "And when you shall receive these things, I would exhort you to ask God, the Eternal Father, in the name of Christ if these things are not true. And if you ask with a sincere heart, with real intent, having faith in Christ, he will manifest the truth of it unto you by the power of the Holy Ghost." I then went into what the word "real intent" meant. Not just wanting to receive an answer about something, but completely and totally intending to ACT upon that answer you receive. Her face changed, and I think she realized that she hadn't had as much real intent as she should to receive her answer. I got her number shortly after that and invited her to keep reading and praying about the Book of Mormon. I also got her number, so hopefully I can keep in contact with her and help her find her answer from God that she needs to have. She would be an AWESOME member of the church. I just hope something in what I said helped a little bit. 

I love you all SO very much. Thank you for your thoughts and prayers!! Please pray for me and my companion. :) 

Sister Nat Savage 

Week #57

February 25, 2013

Hey familia!! 

So good to hear from you all. :) I love hearing from my family... it’s the best thing ever!! Can I get a pedigree chart emailed to me of 3 generations? I need it for our little one hour of service here on T2. We're starting to be able to do our family history which is really cool!! I'm way excited for it.

We had a really good week this week. It's been crazy, but good. We definitely don't have as much time to do missionary work as Zone Leaders, but it has been a really good learning experience for me and has helped me really concentrate and focus when I DO have time to do missionary work. It has also helped me become a better teacher. I still really lack on that part, but what is interesting is that when we got the numbers for our zone for this past week (We get our weekly total numbers to see what our zone needs to work on, where our strengths and weaknesses are, etc.), and we realized that our little zone struggles with teaching. We've decided to focus our zone meetings on teaching the sisters how to teach others. We had a really good zone meeting last week that Sister Marand and I were SOO nervous about (it was our first time being zone leaders so we had no idea what we were doing ha ha). It is hard to do something that you've NEVER done before, but it has also been incredible to see how much the Lord is directing us. We've been able to receive revelation for our zone. It's such a cool experience to have that!!! I'm sure it is the same experience both mom and dad have had when they've had callings in the church, and especially with raising us children. I feel like I've been able to get a glimpse of what it will be like to have children and how to receive revelation for them. Hope that makes sense... ha ha! I'm a little tired today. Pretty cool stuff though! 

I realize more than ever that this truly is just another assignment I've been given, and it doesn't make me any better than anyone else. We had to teach at the Leadership Training this week and I was SO nervous. It was hard to speak at it. We had an emergency transfer in our zone (yes, within the first week 2 sisters hated each other and refused to work with each other... so sad.) So, we have been dealing with WAY too much drama recently. I was already done with being a ZL ha ha! Some of the other ZL's in the mission judged a bit (I thought that was pretty fitting that dad and mom had talked about judging in their email this week ha!), but I remember doing the exact same thing when I saw other emergency transfers going on in the mission. I had to just swallow my pride and be okay with the fact that Sister Marand and I did all we could do to help those sisters out (exchanges, meetings with them, etc). I guess we all have our agency. I'm just glad our zone is back to normal for now! :)

But on a happier note...One cool thing we get to do is take VIP tours of Temple Square... can you say SCARY??!! Ha ha! Sis Marand has taken VIP tours before (in French) but this was my first time.  We took Dr. Frank Mora. He's from Washington DC and is a guest speaker at a college in Provo. The church actually has a calling for people to take these VIP guests around T2 with us so it is not just us sisters doing it, so guess who came with us??! Elder Richard Hinckley, son of Gordon B. Hinckley!! :) Ha ha! (his calling is Church Tour historian or something like that). It was so awesome! He is the nicest man you'll ever meet. It was so funny too...we took Dr. Mora to the Conference Center and Elder Hinckley showed him the picture of President Hinckley and says, "This is the man who actually thought of the design for this place. Very brilliant man, and I'm not just saying that because he's my father!" :) It was so funny. Anyway, I'm having quite the amazing experiences here on T2! 

I think I mentioned last week that we now have Relief Society on Thursday mornings for us sisters, and guess who spoke to us??!! Sister Carol Stevens, the 1st counselor in the Relief Society!! :) It was incredible! Her talk was amazing. She talked about the relief society, how it got started, but also about the Atonement of Jesus Christ and the importance of missionary work. She told us her stories of how she got a phone call from Elder Nelson's secretary first to be in the Young Women General Presidency (I think? Can't remember..), and then how she years later got a call from President Eyring's secretary. She said both times she lied in bed the whole night praying and repenting of her sins, ha ha. It always feels good to know that even incredible ladies like her have to repent. :) We're getting excited for this week’s Relief Society meeting... we've all been given the talk "Beware of Pride" to study beforehand to prepare for the meeting. I LOVE that talk! It'll be so good for me to read it again. 

If any of the men in our family that have served missions have advice for me... I would seriously appreciate it, ha ha! I've never even been a DL before and have no idea how to do this. Anything you noticed that helped you on your missions would be great. We've done a Standard of Excellence for our little zone and are planning on going on exchanges soon, as well as doing zone meetings with a lot of roleplaying and them teaching each other, etc. 

One more thing... Birko was baptized yesterday!! (I thought she got baptized a month ago, but she changed the date... and now she's baptized!! :)) Really cool story about her that is almost EXACTLY like dad's story he told me a few weeks ago! Apparently, over there in bitter cold Germany, the water heater broke in the chapel she was getting baptized in, so the water in the font was FREEZING cold. The members tried to pour warmer water from elsewhere but it didn't work ha... She said the member that baptized her got in the water and was SOOO so cold, and apologized to her for how cold it was!! But then, she said she stepped into the water and felt nothing. She just felt a warm sensation all over her body. She didn't remember it being cold at all!! I shared with her Dad's experience on his mission and she just thought it was the COOLEST thing ever that my investigator had that same experience. Birko completely focused on the spirit and the Lord gave her that wonderful tender mercy. The gospel is DEFINITELY true!! 

I love you all so much. :) 

Love, 

Sister Natalie Savage 

Week #56

February 18, 2013

Hi family and friends! 

Can you believe it??!! I'm in the double-digits!!!! So crazy! I can't believe my mission has gone by this fast... It feels like I just began my mission yesterday!! 

It's been SO good to be back on Temple Square again... I feel like a normal missionary!! :) I have an AWESOME companion, Sister Marand from France (Soeur Marand... you pronounce it "Ma-hun." with kind of a guttural sound. Way too hard to explain, ha). We've never really been able to get to know each other here on T2, but she's awesome! I love her so much, and she has taught me a lot in these past few days. She's in her last transfer, and this transfer is only 5 weeks long because of the MTC needing to crank out new missionaries. So yes, it's official. I'm coming home on June 12th! At first I was upset about it and considered extending, but I know there's a reason. Even if that reason is that I'll be able to see Mom's last Upstage show! :) I can help you out a lot with that Mom. I'll need things to do when I get home, that's for sure!

Well, I can't believe I'm saying this, but I now only have 4 short months left on my mission. 4!!! When on earth did this happen??!! Including this transfer, I only have 3 left. Sooo, so scary!!  But anyway... I've been soooo insanely busy since I've been back here on Temple Square... I literally haven't stopped moving, ha!! But its awesome! I've absolutely love it. I missed T2 SOOO much in that way. I love having something to do all the time. I feel like in my outbound mission I had WAY too much time where we didn't have things to do. Needless to say, T2 is definitely my home and I'm SO glad to be back!! :) I'll miss my outbound zone a lot, but its nice to only have one companion who's very obedient and hard working. It definitely helps the work move forward. :) 

Well even though I haven't had time to do much missionary work, Sis Marand and I have been able to see SO many miracles. It's incredible how much the Lord blesses us when we do what's right and we're obedient.  I was given the assignment of Zone Leader (I have absolutely NO idea what I'm doing) which has proven to definitely be difficult... we don't have much time to teach or anything because we're constantly doing things for the zone, but we've seen incredible miracles this week already!! The Lord is being good to us. I love these sisters in my zone SO much already! We've had some difficulties with a companionship in our zone (and its only day 5...), but I know that Heavenly Father will give us the revelation that we need to have in order to get through it and to help the companionship out. Mom, you were definitely inspired with what you said about marrying someone that is hard working and self-motivated. It feels SO good to be with someone that wants to work hard!!! It gets me even more motivated just thinking about it. I think this will help me a lot!! And Dad, you were inspired about mentioning the "subtle hint" story... I'll try my best to avoid that, ha! :) 

Well fam, I know this letter is short, but I love you all SO very much. I love this Gospel more than anything in the world, and I feel SO privileged and honored to be serving the Lord and bringing our Heavenly Father's children back to Him. I know this Church is real, it's true, and it is completely and totally inspired of God. One of my investigators before I left outbound will be getting baptized this weekend. :) (one that Sis Nakaima and I took on a tour. Soo fun to see these blessings!!) I told her to send me pictures... so hopefully she does so soon! (Speaking of pictures, I forgot my cord... again... ha-ha! I don't know whats wrong with me lately!!) I sent you a couple though which should help. Please pray for me to have the strength and energy I need this transfer to help my zone and Sis Marand's and my investigators. I love you so much and miss you all!! Have a great week!! 

Love always, 

Sister Natalie Savage

Natalie with her Southern California Sister missionaries

Natalie returns to Temple Square and Christie "runs into her" on Valentine's night as she and Brooks pass out valentines to the Sister missionaries.

Week #54

February 4, 2013

Hey fam-bam!! 

Well, this week was suuuuper rough, ha ha! After having such a miracle week last week, we were bound to get a week of cancelled appointments and rejection... but that's okay!!! We just pushed through everything and it was great. :) We did, however, get 2 new investigators this week which was exciting!! And, we got a new Ward Mission Leader (FINALLY!!) and now we actually have one, ha ha! Bishop simply can't do both jobs... but anyway, his name is Brother Tyler Clark. He served his mission in Mexico and was known for getting into people's doors tracting... every house he knocked on!! :) So awesome!! He's super legit, for lack of a better term. :) He's amazingly awesome. The sisters are lucky they get to work with him!! He's already planning on visiting people for us, taking out the ward missionaries with him... this ward has changed SO much since I've been here!! Ward Council was amazing on Sunday. President Chase, the stake President, is incredible and is really getting these wards to focus on missionary work. It's SO awesome!! We're going to have a missionary fireside, potentially a 40 day Fast for missionary work, and an activity to learn about "Missionary Survival Kits" included with pamphlets, pass-along cards, mormon.org cards, copies of the Book of Mormon, etc. SOO awesome!! I love this work so much!! 

Well the closer I get to leaving here the sadder I get, but I'm also excited to get back to Temple Square and to use the things that I have learned here in Ontario. I'm so thankful for the experiences that I've had here, and the miracles that I've seen. The Lord has been way too good to me! I have loved my mission... more than anything else in my life. The longer I've been out here on my mission, the more I've learned how much I need to change about myself... but that's what its about, isn't it?! That's the purpose of life right there--- learning, growing, changing... becoming a new person in Christ. I love Him so much, my wonderful Savior and Redeemer. We had an awesome Zone Conference this week where Sister Godwin showed us a video that talked about the Savior's Atoning sacrifice, and in the video Elder Holland spoke. He said something along the lines of, "The reason why the Savior went what he went through is because Salvation is NOT a cheap thing!!!" SO powerful, right?!!! I love knowing that that is true... it's not a cheap thing, its not an EASY thing. It shouldn't be easy!! If it is ever easy for us, then something is wrong... ha ha. And I've realized that this week more than ever before. I can't even tell you the kind of rejection we had, but I KNOW for a fact that I am doing the right thing out here. I'm doing the Lord's work, His way. It's not supposed to be easy or simple. In fact, the more complicated and hard it is the BETTER!! :) Ha ha. 

I was thinking the other day though about the things that I've learned on my mission.. one of them being how to take on criticism. You all know how I've taken criticism in the past... ha ha. . . not well. :) I was always so "sensitive" (AKA prideful) that it was always so hard for me to hear people telling me that I needed to change and improve, because I already knew that I needed to... now I'm still definitely FAR from perfect at accepting this, but I've become SO much better at handling criticism and correction since I've been out here. It is really amazing. I don't get offended nearly as much... I'm actually able to like it and embrace it! If that's all I learn from my mission, its definitely worth it.  I just hope I never go back to the person I used to be and I continually and very slowly get better, especially after my mission... 

Anyway, I better go. I love you guys SOOO very much!! You are amazing. Thank you for the incredible amounts of love and support out here. I appreciate it more than you know!! :) Love you all!! 

Sister Savage