Letter #3

Hi family!!!

Wow, thank you all SO much for the emails!! I got tons this week, ha! It made me feel so good! I love hearing about how all of you are doing. Dad, I got both of your emails and mom's email. And everyone else’s. Except for Stephen. ;) Sounds like everyone is doing great. I miss you guys and pray for you often! :) I put your names in the prayer roll last week.

Speaking of the temple... I LOVE it!! It is the most amazing place on this earth. As soon as I walk in, the spirit hits me like a brick wall. its incredible! I'm hoping that I'll be able to go every week on my mission... that's my goal right now! We'll see if that happens though! :) I'm so glad that I am developing a testimony of the temple. One of the sisters in our district, Sis Nixon, really doesn't have much of a testimony... she finally figured out this week why she is here on a mission, and I think she's gotten better since then. We're all trying to help her by just being there for her and bearing our testimonies to her. Mostly just by being good examples.

Sis Brickley and I are doing great :) one of the sisters came to us complaining about her companion, and we both talked about it after and were SO grateful that we weren't that way! that we can talk to each other about things that bother us and work things out between us. She's really been a great companion. She's help me lighten up and have fun!

Yesterday was our last day of classes... :( SAD! I nearly cried several times. Brother Pack was a great teacher, but Brother Snyder is truly incredible. I can't even tell you how much he changed my life. I'm a different person because of that man. I owe him a lot! He has made me a better teacher in SO many ways. He taught me how to have PASSION in the gospel, to not be one of those robot-sisters that have no feeling (yes, I've met several here) but to be fun and happy when teaching about the gospel, because that's exactly what it is!! There's a reason why we call Heavenly Father's plan for us the plan of Happiness, because it truly brings that to us.

Brother Snyder had all the Elders in our district go around the room and say something nice about each sister, or something they admire, etc. It was so sweet... nearly every elder there said they appreciated the spirit that I brought into our district/class, and that they could tell that I try my best and that I'm here to work. It was seriously the nicest set of compliments I have ever received! I love my elders!! Brother Snyder also went around the room and said something good about all of us, and told me that I have a gift in teaching, which, according to my blessing I do, but I didn’t think I have it yet.... I always thought I needed to work on it. I think because I am working on it, I'm getting better. EFY helped me out a lot with that too. He also said (and this is where I got tears in my eyes) that he didn't worry about me, that he could tell I was on the direct path to the Celestial Kingdom. I have never in my entire life received a nicer compliment! He made me feel so good and really boosted my confidence. I love that man. I wish everyone could have such an amazing teacher.

I had a really humbling experience this week with teaching. My companion and I didn't realize that we were supposed to teach someone one day (a progressing investigator), so we just kind of walked in by the seat of our pants, didn't really prepare or anything. It was by far the worst lesson we've taught. We walked out and looked at each other and both actually started laughing because it was so bad... haha! but it taught me a super important lesson. (btw, loved what Stephen learned about promptings! thanks for sharing mom!) Not only do we need to have the spirit with us when we teach (or during anything for that matter), but we need to put the WORK into it. Without working out hardest and humbling ourselves, we won't be able to teach. The spirit can't always prompt us with no information to take from! But when we study and ponder and pray and try our hardest to come up with a good lesson plan, THEN the spirit will come, and be able to help us bear testimony/prompt us when we need to change the subject, etc. Such a great thing to learn.

I also had another experience with the last lesson we taught to Bro Snyder, who was "steve." He only gave us 10 min to prepare a 5 min lesson, and only gave us a few things to know about him. What my comp and I had prepared was completely different than what Steve needed... during the beginning of the lesson I had the thought that we should teach about Joseph Smith and the restoration instead of what we had prepared (which was that God was our loving Heavenly Father, that we can communicate to him through prayer, etc). I ignored that prompting because my comp continued talking about what we had prepared... but I realized that if I had acted on that prompting RIGHT AWAY, our lesson would've been SO much better, and would've fit Steve's needs a lot better... I learned the same thing Stevie learned with his ipod. It's often small and not very significant promptings that we ignore, but it can make all the difference! !

Well I'm running short on time.. but Bro Clayton Christensen (former seventy) came and spoke to us on Sunday. Mom, do you remember that email you had me read when we were at Disneyland, about missionary work? Well, Bro Christensen is the man in those stories!!! His dad was the one that was the inactive man's home teacher, and he was the one that assigned "homework" to that other investigator. You should read that story and forward it to the family. But it was SO cool to sit there during the talk about be able to take notes!! I loved that talk but I was sad I couldn't print it off and bring it before I left. Now I don't have to! ;)

Family, I love you guys SO much! Keep reading the scriptures! really study them. I can't even tell you how much it has helped me. I feel so much stronger since I've been here. It's definitely not easy... missionary work is hard! but it's so worth it. I'm so glad I'm here!! :)

Mom thank you SO much for the package!! you are so funny, ha. Thanks Brad for Chantel's address!! Good luck this week! Let me know how it goes! ;)

I love you all so much! Thanks for all the support and prayers. They really help.

Read 2 Nephi 31- it's my new favorite chapter in the BOM :)

LOVE YOU ALL!!!

Sister Savage :)