Week #17

Hi Fam!!

I hope everyone is doing well. :)  Last p-day we went bowling with a lot of the sisters in my zone-- it was SO much fun!! And we were even able to wear pants in public!! Ha! Only for bowling and the zoo can we do that, which is pretty fun. :) Sister Crookston and I are excited to have a p-day that's more relaxing today. :) It’s her birthday today!!! We took her sister and her sister’s fiance on a tour today too. Her sister's fiance isn't a member of the church, but he is getting baptized next week, so it was fun to help him realize that this choice is the right one for him. It was a good experience.

I am totally in love with Welfare Square!! It is such a great venue. So cool to see all that our fast offerings go to! It is truly an inspired program. We only get to take 2 tours a week there, but we're loving it. Its a great opportunity. Of course, that also means that I get to learn & get familiar with 2 new scripts (Welfare Square and the Beehive house).... Ha ha. Let's just say it is a little bit overwhelming!! But it has been a great experience. The first couple of times on a tour I basically just bore my testimony about what Sister Crookston was saying.  But I've been able to pick up a few things here and there, especially at the Beehive house. We are there on Wednesdays for literally 8 hours straight giving tours, so I pretty much am forced to pick up on the script quick! :) It's nice for us as missionaries having a script, because we can basically tell them as much or as little as possible... I've learned a LOT about the Beehive house. Something in particular that I learned, I will share in my personal letter to mom. :) You'll love it fam!! It seriously makes the Beehive House such a special, and almost sacred place. I feel much more blessed now than I did before to be able to work there once a week.

I'll tell you one thing... the Beehive House is SUCH a hard venue to work at!!! And honestly, the members are usually the worst. They always come in and completely kill the spirit by asking how many wives Brigham Young had, or how many children he and Mary Ann had together compared to Lucy Decker. It can be very frustrating. This is a special place that these people are coming to. This is literally where 3 prophets of God have lived. Brigham sacrificed SO much!! He wasn't just the prophet of the church, he was the governor of Utah, director of Indian Affairs, and he had his family that he had to take care of. Despite all of this, he still had his family gather in a room together every night at 6:30 pm and read the scriptures, sing hymns, and learn more about Jesus Christ together.  After learning so much about Brigham Young’s life and the sacrifices he made, I have developed a much deeper love and respect for him. He was a great man and servant of the Lord.

This week has been a little bit tough. Long Su and his family met with missionaries once, but his wife and kids started to go to another church for a couple weeks and decided they liked it. (They never went to one of our services.) Long Su told us that it didn't make sense to him to go to a different church than his family was going to, so he decided to just go with this church for now and stop investigating ours. We asked him if he had been able to read the Book of Mormon at all, and he said no. I was completely devastated. I don't think I've ever felt so much sadness during the mission. I actually cried! (That doesn't happen to often!) But then it got worse. Just Thursday, we called Melinda to see how she was doing and if she was getting excited for her baptism (scheduled for May 14th), and she told us that she had stopped meeting with the missionaries and had canceled her date. We kept asking her why, but she just kept saying "I just don't believe it. I don't believe that prophets exist. I don't believe that they have authority... I'm just going to go to the church I grew up with and read the Bible." Sister Crookston and I (mainly me) tried to explain to her why prophets are so important, especially that they have that authority directly from God to run his church and receive revelation for us, but it wasn't working. We weren't listening to her real concern, what really was happening. We talked for a long time after that about what just happened. Sis Crookston and I realized that the spirit was telling both of us to be quiet and LISTEN to her, but ignored those promptings. I felt so horrible after, I literally felt sick to my stomach. I knew that the Holy Ghost was trying to help Sister Crookston and I out, but we weren't listening. We weren't letting him guide. I didn't have enough humility to hear the spirit's soft whispering.

I learned a huge lesson that day. It truly is the spirit that speaks to people, not us. That's the only way we can help others is through the Holy Ghost. That is the only way they can feel what we are saying is true. But we also need LOVE! These investigators NEED to feel loved by us. We realized after that she probably didn't feel love from us at all while we were talking to her. We didn't even take the time to consider her side, how she was feeling about all this. I think Melinda was feeling overwhelmed with everything and just completely gave up trying to understand. Love is so, so important for these people to feel from us. There's no reason for them to listen to us if we don't love them. The Savior showed us this example, and truly, "We love him, because he first loved us." (1 John 4:19) Please pray for me to have humility and love for the people that Sister Crookston and I teach on the square and on the phone. I think humility and love will help me be a much more effective missionary.

Well family, I love you lots. Thank you for the emails and prayers. I really do feel them daily! Christie, if you are able to come up, don't come on my p-day because I for sure won't see you. :) I won't really be on the square, ha.

Love you all so much!

Sister Savage