February 14, 2018
Hi mom:)
sorry I haven’t written a group email in while
but things are going so good!!!i love my companion so much! she’s honestly
training me more than I’m training her ahahah she’s amazing though... she’s has
this weird power to make anyone and everyone cry.... no joke every lesson we
have or tour we take everyone ends up crying... mostly me. but nonetheless
tears are shed
I feel like I am learning sooo much though.
seriously every day i feel like there is something that the Lord is trying to
teach me. Sometimes (most of the time) its patience, with myself, my
investigators, all the other sisters.... no matter what though I am learning!
But one thing I have really been learning this past week is that we need to
love the people around us.
I was reading a talk called "A Brother Offended" By Neal A.
Maxwell (everyone go read it) and it really helped me realize how much we need
to strengthen the people that we know and love that are around us! Our
families, our friends, everyone in some way or another needs to feel God's love
in their lives at some point. In the talk it mentions how that love needs to be
genuine, it cant be some check mark on a list, but it needs to be from our
hearts and from a place where we sincerely want to help, so anyone and everyone
reading this..... find someone who needs to feel loved, pray to know how you
can specifically help them and love them and then go and do what you feel is
right!!! and then email me what happens because I know that miracles will
happen and I wanna hear:)
Miracles have been happening here on the square this past week!!!!! We
are meeting SO many amazing people who have such a huge desire to learn. Its so
crazy! also I met the ambassador of Pakistan this week??? who knew he would
come here to temple square??? he was super nice though ahah when we met him he
said "welcome to temple square" and we were like uhmmmm shouldnt it
be us saying that??? but thats okay because he was so sweet aahah
anyways i love being a missionary its the best thing:) I love you tons and tons!!!!!
Sister Piepgrass
here is my companion and I :) we were pretending to be investigators for
another companionship so we got to not wear our tags for the tour and it felt
weird
January 23, 2018
HI MOM!
I sincerely don’t know if I have
ever been so happy in my whole life, and its kinda weird because I’m,
constantly tired or studying or something.... but idk I’m just SO happy doing
it!!!!
these past 2 (or is it 3?) weeks
have been crazy fun. lots is happening!!! one of the biggest things is that we
got a new mission president!! He is SO nice. we all love him so much already.
One of the first things he told us was "don’t marry a slug, marry someone
cool" so I can already tell im gunna learn lots form him ahah
also this week is transfers!!!
ah!!! and I’m gunna be a mom!!! (aka I’m training!!!) I’m mostly excited...
only a lil bit scared but that’s only because Ill be training in the Beehive
House which just requires you to know A LOT of facts about the church and
prophets and Brigham Young! But im excited for the challenge mostly though I
think it’ll be super fun!!! Also we moved apartments today ( im moving into a
big one thank heavens) and i realized how hard moving is.... and i literally
have only a lil bit of stuff but man its hard!!! growing
this past two weeks I feel like I
have changed so much for some reason... not too sure why. But my faith is
growing more than I ever thought possible. I have felt time and time again that
I have a Heavenly Father who loves me, and I know that He is aware of all the
little things that I am going through. Im grateful for the love and support He
gives all of us as we go through our trials. Prayer is on of the most
influential things we can start our day with! As we pray and ask the Lord for
strength, He will help us!! I know that because I have felt it more than I ever
have here.
In my studying I came across a
scripture that I love so much!!!
1 Samuel 16:7 "For the Lord
seeth not as man seeth; for a man looketh on the outward appearance, but the
Lord looketh on the heart"
How good is that?! The Lord sees
us for who we really are, and because He knows us perfectly, He wants us to
pray and talk with Him. He doesn't judge or criticize, He simply listens, then
helps, comforts and strengthens:)
i love this church and i love the
Book of Mormon
i hope you have a good
week........ don’t miss me too much:)
oh and I LOVE YOU SO MUCH
sister piepgrass
this is a cute lil pic of my cute
lil companion making me some delish thai food (gunna miss it so much:( but this
was some sticky rice!!!!)
January 9, 2018
HIIIII
this week was i think my favourite of the mission
so far! a lot happened!! first, on Wednesday we had Zone Conference which is
seriously the most amazing day ever! My mission president and his wife are
seriously the most amazing people ever!!! He taught us how we need to be "rock
solid, true blue, through and through" disciples of Christ. And seriously
I felt like a whole new missionary walking out of the meeting!! President
taught us how to really help people see how life changing the Book of Mormon
can be, if they let it. I LOVE the Book of Mormon so much. I LOVE teaching
people it, I love handing it out to people that I meet on the square in their
languages (SO MANY!) and I love hearing how people learn from it differently.
Its the best
so after zone conf my companion and I were walking back to the square
from our home and we saw this guy who looked pretty scary and we followed
him.... (maybe not a good idea but it seemed safe in the moment lol) and we
followed him into the North Visitors Center up to the statue of Christ and then
we go and sit next to him and talk to him and turns out he did go through
something extremely hard that day and as we started talking to him we learned
that he used to be a drug addict and dealer and his life was not going in a
good direction and then one day missionaries came to his door and he knew from
the moment he shook their hands that the church was true! He then started
telling us how the church has changed his life and THEN we realized he is
literally the smartest human ever... he started explaining the Book of Mormon
and the Bible and how to intertwine and I was so amazed Seriously I learned so
much from him. And at the end he kept saying " you missionaries are truly
super-heroes.... who else literally saves lives like you guys do?" aw man
he was the BEST. and his name was steve..... meant to be am i right dad???
steves are the BESTok BUT exactly after we had the best morning with president
and the best chat with Steve.... we go to our next assignment and start talking
to this anti who was very Christian and he talked to us for an hour and a
half.... it was the hardest talk ive ever had with a person and man he had some
harrrrd questions... and he stayed until temple square closed. and then at the
end he asked if he could come back and ask us more questions and we were like
ya sure!!!! (not actually thinking that he would literally come back) WELL he
did. yesterday we heard that there was a guy looking for us and wanted to talk
to us and so we came upstairs and saw that it was him and we were like
ahhhhhhhhh hey what’s up!!??? we were pretty scared but also confident so it
was okay but lets just say we talked with him again for an hour and a half and
the convo ended with me and my comp crying ahahha BUT i have never been so
grateful for a person, because he strengthened my testimony SO MUCH. i have
never had to defend the Book of Mormon and testify what it has done for me
personally so much in my whole life. So although he may not have accepted it
now, I know one day he will and I am so excited for him!!!! hidden
blessings!!!! also im grateful for my companion because she is the most amazing
missionary ah
I am SO grateful for this church. I am sososo grateful for the Book of
Mormon and the power it truly does have to change our lives!!! This week I
learned that more than I ever have in my whole life. a sister in my zone
said"I stand with Jesus Christ, I stand with Joseph Smith and the Book of
Mormon, because they stand by me" -Sister Merling I love that she said
that so much. And I could not agree more! I feel the strengthening power it has
in my life everyday when I study it. Everyday I learn more about the Savior and
His loving grace for us and I grow a deeper desire to help others feel that as
well because I know that no matter what you are going through, that feeling can
change everything! I have seen it in myself and my companion and my
investigators!
then the next day I saw uncle Bart and Aunt Alonna and it just made me
so happy!!!! it was honestly just what I needed!!! So fun seeing fam :)
also today we went to china town and yes I spent WAY too much on rice
crackers but how can you not. it was a whole new world in there and my
companion was just going to town finding thai things and teaching what things
to use to make pad thai and i felt like a whole new person walking out of there
ah i kinda had a glimpse of what amy is going to be living in for the next year
and a half ahahha ugh shes awesome but ya while we were there we took some pics
with some pandas...... also the other pic is me and sister Pazos :) she’s my
bff and she’s from Puebla Mexico and yes we have already arranged my trip to
visit her...... so far after my mission i am going to Thailand, Mexico,
ok luv ya!!!!!!!!!!
December 19, 2017
hi mom :)
this week was good! transfers are
insane i found out even though im still with my trainer its still so crazy! we
all go to our zone leaders room and they read out who our new companions going
to be and what assignment we have and where we will be moving to! I have West
Gate this transfer which means im on the square and I get to sit at this lil
cute warm booth at the west gate and i control the square lol sounds intense
but really i just make sure that there are sisters at every assignment and desk
and if there isnt then i have to find covers! it can get kinda stressful but i
love it its fun:)
it was a little bit of a rougher
week this week.... but also i realized that when i have rough days that my
prayers are being answered in ways that i totally dont expect and im beyond
grateful for that! it was also a really humbling week! i was reading a talk and
in it a question was asked that hit me so hard. it said " What would Jesus
Christ do with my opportunities?" and it made realize that I am literally
representing Him, and everything I do, say, and think has to reflect that! I
listened to "If the Savior Stood Beside Me" after and I was so happy
and honoured to be a missionary and that has helped me all throughout this
week! I was thinking... if I were to go home today... already I would be a
completely different person because my love for Jesus Christ has grown soo
much! seriously so much more than I ever thought it would. I am just sooo
grateful this week
M Russel Ballard (ahhhh!!!) asked
to speak to us this week in our sacrament meeting and it was sooo good!!! he
was talking about how we should never complain (lol me) but he related it to
the pioneers, and the the atonement, then he said "sisters.... you have no
idea what hard is!" ahahah all of us were like ya true and now everytime I
think I’m tired or have a headache I realize that it is nothing compared to
what our Savior when through, or what the pioneers had to do to come here! man
this week was good
also one day I was studying in
the new testament... which is my new favourite thing but i was reading in my
fav book- Romans- and I was getting a lot of people this week asking where good
scriptures were that explained how much God loves us. and when I came across
Romans 8:35-39 I was sooo touched by how comforting this scripture is.
35 Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or
famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword?
36 As it is written, For thy sake we are killed all the day long;
we are accounted as sheep for the slaughter.
37 Nay, in all these things we
are more than conquerorsthrough him that loved us.
38 For I am persuaded, that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor
principalities, nor powers, nor things present, nor things to come,
39 Nor height, nor depth, nor any other creature, shall be able
to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ
Jesus our Lord.
seriously I love this scripture
so much!!! it says that literally nothing can separate us from how much God
loves us. After studying this I was given so many opportunities to share it
this week, and I realized thats because so many people dont realize or
understand how much God really does love them. no matter what! I meet so many
people here that are antis and are so against what we believe, but I love
talking to them because no matter what, whenever I share a scripture I always
feel the spirit, and although they cant feel it, I know that these things are
true and I just pray that one day they will accept it as well
its weird thinking its christmas
next week... it doesnt really feel like it though cause it still hasnt snowed
(????!!!) but praying it will soon!!!! last year apparently it snowed on
Christmas eve which is the cutest thing ive ever heard so im hoping it
does that
big shoutout to Elder Karrens
mom- Melissa!!!!!! thank u for the homeade cookies!!!!! my heart is full!!!
(mostly cause I ate so many of ur cookies but also cause im so happy) so thank
you i luv ya! :)
have a good Christmas mom and fam
and friends :) I miss you and I love you so much
Sister Piepgrass:)
