Letter #9

March 5, 2012

Hey family!

Thank you SO much for all of the emails this week! All of my siblings wrote me this week. :) I feel so blessed to have you guys in my life. There are some sisters here who sometimes don't even get an email... it's so nice to feel so much support and love from you! I love you all so much.

Dad, thank you so much for sending me those pioneer stories! I was able to use them a few times this week.  Grandma and Grandpa Neibaur were seriously amazing people! How cool to know I have relatives like that.

Congrats to mom on getting called to be the Primary President!!  I loved your experience of feeling the "mantle" mom. I have definitely had moments here where I have felt the mantle of being a missionary fall on me. A few of those moments happened this week.

  

Before I tell you about those, some pretty exciting stuff has been going on this week in the Temple Square mission! We not only had our boundaries "extended," but we also got new key indicators! They make SO much more sense, and are actually much more like a normal mission. Our key indicators now consist of Lessons taught to members and guests (in all venues), Referrals received, contacted, sent and transitioned (sent meaning we sent the missionaries over to them, and transitioned meaning the investigators are now in the missionaries' hands!), and new investigators from all venues. (Our venues are inbound and outbound calls when people call in, or when we call them, chat, and of course, contacts on the square. :) And a MIRACLE happened this week. Seriously, this is a big deal. I actually like calling people!!  Who would've ever thought Natalie Savage would like to talk on the phone??  Especially with people I've never met before! Crazy! :) I actually like it better than on the square... anyway, back to the key indicators. They truly are amazing! It's making the missionary work so much better here, already! The mission is much more like a normal mission now. We now try to "teach" everyone we come in contact with. Our mission is not just to get referrals-- its now to teach and uplift EVERYONE we talk to. So cool. And I've noticed that the members don't mind at all if we share a spiritual thought with them or get into things like that. 

I felt more of the Spirit this week than I think I have my whole life. I've been praying that I would be able to recognize the Spirit better, and I had some seriously cool experiences with that. We talked to this man on the square who was from Texas originally but then moved to the East coast and was in SLC for a convention ... which I've found that conventions bring TONS of people to Temple Square. Anyway, we got talking with him and found out he had read the whole BOM 15 years ago, had a best friend from the Marine's that was Mormon, and has met with missionaries before. We talked to him for almost 2 hours... he's part of the Church of Christ. His friend who was in the Marine's sounds like a great guy. His friend told Mark everything about the church--he seriously knows almost everything about the church. We started talking about how the church would be organized today, if Jesus Christ himself would organize it. He told us the way our church has organized ourselves makes sense to him. :) Yes it does!! And it was really cool, because he was telling us about how many denominations there are of the Christians, (Baptists, Southern Baptists, Protestants, etc) and how it didn't make sense to him that there would be so many different denominational churches. He basically asked "Why aren't there more denominations of Mormons?" The Spirit was so incredibly strong. It was seriously telling me, "Because we have a prophet who was chosen by God himself to teach the same exact principles and doctrines that Christ himself would teach. That was it. It really is that simple. Heavenly Father loves us too much to let us go through this life without having some sort of guide to get us there. That's why we have a prophet- because he cares about us; he wants us to have leadership to help us out.

It was so interesting because he told us that he read the BOM with the intent that he was going to find something wrong or false in it, but couldn't find anything at all. ha! The only thing he can't get past is why the gold plates were taken back up to heaven. He wants proof of it. So Sis Wilson asked him, "Well, do you know where the ten commandments are?" And he was like, "... That's a good point." Of course it is Mark. Just be baptized already! Just kidding... anyway, we got talking a lot more about that and how the BOM tells us that this church is true, and that we receive revelation today; the heavens are not closed. But he said, "Well, everything in the BOM I agree with. I can't find a single thing in there that isn't something that I personally believe. But I can also find all of that stuff in the Bible... So, why do I need the BOM?" UGH. I hate that question. So I asked him, "Why do you think God wouldn't give us more scripture? Why would he not keep speaking to us today, especially in a world that's steadily getting more and more wicked? Don't you think he would want us to have more?"

He couldn't think of an answer. It was awesome. :)

Unfortunately he didn't refer, because he is still hung up on the fact that he doesn't need the Book of Mormon... but it was such a great experience to be able to teach and testify. He seriously was SO close!!

We have a new investigator!! His name is Todd, a truck driver from Illinois ... he's great. His fiancee was baptized sometime last year and won't marry him until he joins the church... lol. We're focusing on him finding out for HIMSELF if it's true or not. Hopefully it goes well.

We also did a Youth Conference on Saturday!! It was sooo much fun!! I felt like I was an EFY counselor again. :) I miss those days! I miss my kids! I met Paul Cardall!  He's a piano player that is SUPER good... He's in the youth's ward and was going to be one of the speakers for it. He seriously was amazing!!

And now, I must go. We did baptisms for the dead in the Salt Lake City Temple today for our Zone activity!! So cool! and now we are going to Tucano's with half our zone. :) I have a pretty great mission!  Also, I passed off my driving. I can't remember if I already mentioned that, but it's so nice to be able to drive! I love it!

I love my mission family. I have truly felt the pain of someone rejecting the gospel, but I know that I was chosen for a reason to be out here. John 15:16 "Ye have not chosen me, but I have chosen you..."

A new favorite quote of mine I heard this week from President Faust; "Hope is trust in God's promises, faith that if we act now, the desired blessings will be fulfilled in the future."

I love my Savior Jesus Christ. I love my Heavenly Father. I love this gospel. It truly brings us real and lasting happiness.

Have a great week! :) Love you all!

Sister Savage

Nat :)

P.S.  I forgot to tell you about the people I met that know Laura! The Busath's. I met them and they were the funniest couple ever!! Tell Laura about it-- they are in her ward. And congrats to Bryce (Kyle's best friend) on getting called to SLC!!! Tell him that I'll be able to see him all of the time, ha!And I might even be able to take his investigators on a tour!!! Cool huh?!