HEYOOOO

6/24/13

Heyo Familia! Como les va?

This has been quite the week!! Really! The Lord is doing some really great things here in the Woodlands! I just love it when you can step back and trace out how some miracles happen, and just marvel in the genius of God!! Seriously!! I don't know if last week I told you, but we have a menos activo family, but they really want to go to the temple and be sealed. They have a really hard time paying tithing, because they haven't really seen the importance. But, that is a requirement for a temple recommend. Well, we were going to do a noche de hogar about a month ago on tithing, but at the last moment we felt that we shouldn't, and we did something else. Well, last week this family came to our ward for the first time in a long time (they go to another ward occasionally that is closer) and guess what the lesson in Sociedad de Socurro was?? It was on tithing!!! How perfect is that?? Well, we could tell that this sister really took the lesson hard, sort of as a chastisement, but we prayed that she would be able to use it in a positive way. Well, then we had dinner with them this week and we just shared a scripture about the power of the Book of Mormon and such. Well, somehow something we had said led into the mom really opening up about how she had felt so guilty after the lesson and how she knew the only way to get rid of that guilt was to obey the law of the tithe and such and she finally understood why it was so important. But her most important reasoning was she didn't want one law to be keeping her and her family from being sealed. It never ceases to amaze me how perfect God's timing is! Everything needs to happen on His timetable.

Another awesome thing is how faithful our "most progressing" investigator is!! We meet with her about three times a week and she has usually read multiple chapters between each visit. I had said we taught her the word of wisdom, and she hasn't had any coffee since then! She told us that it doesn't matter if the coffee is bad or good for her body, it is just a test of faith. WOW. Seriously? Every time we visit I feel like she teaches me so much more than I can teach her; and, she came to church yesterday!!!!! It was her first time coming! And yesterday was kind of weird, because normally our block is from 3:00-6:00, but since we had the broadcast yesterday we just had sacrament meeting from 3-4:30, then a little break and then watched the broadcast, and she stayed for it! We really wanted her to, because it is something else for the investigator to really be able to listen to the Prophets voice, regardless of the message. But it was awesome because I think it really helped her see how important this work is!! She had no idea how much work went into it. That it is so much more that a bunch of jovens going out to share a really awesome book of scripture, but that is an organized mandate of God! So that was great, great, great day. :)

Did you guys get to watch the broadcast? It was so awesome. Well, I wish I could say I completely understood everything.. but we watched in Spanish.. but I did get the general feel; the excitement of the work! And no worries, we are going to watch it this week during training time... in English. But I have to admit I got teary eyed when they had the little videos of "I hope they call me on a mission" and then "we'll bring the world His truth"... It made me think about, well, how I am so lucky to be out here?? At 19. I don't even know. I am truly grateful for the opportunity to be a missionary. To be one of the 70,000 bringing the world His truth.

I love you all so much. Thank you for the support and love!! We just keep on keeping on. Reemplace miedo con fe.

Les Quiero,

Hermana Draper... or hermana diaper as some of the members like to say... apparently in a spanish accent they sound similar.. :)

FELIZ DE LOS PADRES!!!

6/17/13

Hola Familia!

Como fue su semana? Feliz Dia de los Padres! Everyone in our ward thinks it’s pretty unfair that we get to call home on mother's day, but not on father's day... oh well.. Nevertheless. Happy Father's Day, Daddyo! :)

Well, it sounds like things have been crazy at home!! I send my love and luck to Mark and Gainell!! There are a ton of visa waiters in my mission and lots are supposed to go to Argentina! There is actually the most darling Hermana in my district who is supposed to go to the "most southern mission" (I don't remember the name) in Argentina! And she said it was being split... so there is a chance that she will be in their mission when her visa comes!

Well, things here in Houston have been going great! We see miracles everyday and I can't express how thankful I am for this opportunity! Well… let's see. Okay so we hadn't been able to visit with our most progressing investigator for quite some time because she had gotten really sick. We tried to visit a few times, but she was always sleeping. Well, we finally got a chance to meet with her again and it was great! We brought along an eighteen year old girl from our ward who is working on her papers (and is native in Spanish) and it was really great! We focused on church and the specialness of it. We read the sacrament prayers and the spirit was really strong. She is such a dedicated investigator and she truly delights in learning and reading the scriptures. We actually went back two days later and she had read a bunch of chapters and started talking about prophets and how great it is that we have them.. which is crazy because that is what we were planning on talking about!! We had printed off the talk that President Monson gave this past conference about how obedience brings blessings, and talk about the word of wisdom, since she loves coffee. But she had already been so prepared for the lesson, when we said that it had been latter day revelation, she totally understood and was willing to change because of that testimony she has in prophets. Most of the time I just sit in lessons and just think it is too good to be true! But it shows that God really has prepared those people, and that when people have real intent, their main desire will be to follow the example of Jesus Christ.

Also... miracle of the week.. We had a ward activity!!!!! And it went so well!! So our ward hasn't had an activity in probably nine months. We were worried that it might not work out, but we had a super fun picnic in the park and a lot of the members came! It was so fun to see the unity. Our ward is so awesome, and it was great because we were able to have them bring friends, and investigators, so it introduced people to the church in a less formal setting, to help them become more comfortable with the members. And man oh man, they really know how to grill... maybe I will send that picture. So much meat!!

Oh also (sorry this letter probably doesn't make sense, and it is all over the place) but we had zone conference/mission tour this past week! Elder Cristoffel Golden from the Seventy came and talked to us and it was awesome! I don't have my notebook with me... and if I did I would probably just ramble on about a whole bunch of stuff... but it was really a great meeting. He is such a smart man! When he finished talking, my mind was blown because I'm pretty sure he has the scriptures memorized... But anyway, I think one of the best things he said though is that it doesn't matter how talented you are, that as a missionary, well as a person in general, your greatest and most powerful talents are your virtue and obedience. When we are obedient and virtuous the Lord will bless us with what we need. It was interesting because he said that the Lord has a big basket full of blessings that he wants to pour down on us, we just need to be obedient, and ask for it.

Well… I love this work. Sorry this email is so scattered, and might not even make sense, but know that I am oh so happy out here! Time flies by way too fast, I just wish it would slow down, but we just have to make the most of every single moment! I love you all so much! Seguir adelante (which translates to quite literally everything I have discovered.. keep on keeping on, roll on, carry on, you know, all those great phrases). Trust in the Lord with all thine heart and He will direct thy paths! Reemplace miedo con fe!

Les Quiero!

Hermana Draper

oh ps. I finally realized why they call her Evita even though her name is Eva... so in Spanish they add an ita or ito to words to make them more endearing like gato--> gatito or hermana--> hermanita or burro (which means donkey)---> burrito! fun fact. good ole spanish. :)

LOOOOOVE YOOOOOUUUUU

HOLA MUCHACHOOOS!

6/10/13

Hola! Como ha andado?

Yes.. it has been another week already! I can't even believe it! This week we started the new transfer and I can't even believe how quickly time is flying! But what a crazy 6 weeks it was! I feel like we just jump into an accelerator or something and you just try to pick up every little thing along the way! Make the most of every second, because I won't ever have "my first transfer in the field" again! Crazy!

But anyway. This week was really great! Now to update you on last weeks miracle… So the lady that we met after the baptism at the members house... well we had set up a noche de hogar for last Tuesday right? Well when we called the member that day to see if it would still work she said that her friend couldn't come!! We were so sad! But we asked if we could still stop by and visit them and they said yes. So then... okay this might be confusing, but I will try and explain it clearly, because it really was crazy. Our 5:00 appointment fell through so we tried to visit the Young Womens president to talk about some jovens that we are working with and she didn't respond until 6:00 to say we could come over, but 6:00 is our finding hour (power hour) and so we asked if we could come at 7:00 and she said yes. So we started talking and one of the young women is a daughter of the family we were visiting that night, then it turns out that the president the girls mom's visting teacher… so she asked if she could come visit with us! Well, of course, we always like to help with unity in the ward so she bought a cake and visited with us. Then, when we got there, their friend was there!! She wasn't going to be able to come, but then she was there and we were so happy! So we ended up doing the noche de hogar after all and taught about the Restoration and watched the short version of the video. The spirit was so strong there. She really took it all in, and having the young womens president there, as well as her family friends, it was a really nice environment. They all shared really powerful testimonies. It is always nice to have member present because it is always great to hear it from someone other than a missionary. Well, then we invited her to say the prayer and she willingly accepted, and the second she said ‘padre celestial’ she broke down into tears. It was one of the most heartfelt prayers I had ever heard. You could tell that she really knew who she was talking to, and maybe she hadn't done that in a long time. The night all in all was a miracle. As we looked back and tried to trace the steps, it was amazing to see how Heavenly Father really knows exactly what to do to make everything fall right into place.

Then, the day after that we had a dinner appointment set up with some of the greatest people, and when we got there their daughter had invited a friend to the dinner! He had never talked to missionaries or really heard much about Christ in general. We taught the restoration and you could tell he was just trying to soak it all in, the huge fire hose that we were spraying at him. But at the end he had said, ‘I wish that my parents would talk about stuff like this, I love to learn about Christ’. We gave him a copy of the Book of Mormon and I think it may have really opened the door for him to have those discussions with his friend. I just love sharing this gospel that is often taken for granted!

This week was a bit crazy. We did go finding a lot. We had lots of appointments fall through, but usually that is just a blessing in disguise because we are able to find someone else that needs our message at that moment.

I am so grateful for the opportunity to be a missionary! Thank you for all the love and support! I am so excited for all of my friends who are out in the field now!

Well... I love you so very much. Remember who you are and all you stand for. Make good choices. Return with honor. Reemplace miedo con fe! (yes.. I did make the humbling discovery this week in language study that it is reemplace, not reemplaze.. it does come from the verb reemplazar, but when it is congugated in command form.. blah blah blah.. glad after 3 months I finally learned how to spell my motto correctly! :))

les quiero,

Hermana Draper.

WELLLLLLL.....WHAT A WEEK!

3 JUNE 2013

 With Sister Chappell, the Church PR person for Houston at the Hurricane Preparedness Fair.

HOOOLA. como han estado??

Wow. Reading through emails has been quite the adventure today!! There are so many amazing things happening! I am so excited for everyone! Mission calls, baptisms, weddings galore! It is so amazing to see how everyone has their own individual path that probably goes a completely different way than anticipated, but it is so perfect for them!

Well, this week really has been quite the week! So we have been able to meet with a few investigators that we haven't seen for a long time! (like since before I got here) and they have been doing really well! Actually, there was one lady whose husband is a member and she has been an investigator for years and years and we have seen her a few times the past few weeks and then on Saturday we decided to just send her a text to invite her to the baptism (I'll talk more about this later) and we never heard back so we weren't expecting anything. Then she showed up!!! It was a miracle!!! She was there and she was able to see that joy and I think it really made something click. Also, Obispo was talking to her and she said she has been having some health issues (since she is pregnant) and then he and one of the elders gave her a blessing. It was just really cool. I am really excited for her!

Also, lessons with our most progressing investigator have been going so great! We meet with her frequently and she just gets it. The other day we were teaching her the plan and she asked us if we had ever gone somewhere and felt like we had been there before but we know that we hadn't. And she said that's how she felt with the plan. That she had learned it all before, but she knew she hadn't... Well. How cool is that? I read somewhere that everyone on earth has already accepted the plan, it's just a matter of reminding them. And it is so true!! So she is doing really great things and really applying it. It makes me so happy to see her progress!

Then this Saturday, I got to go to Houston! First off, it is a beautiful city. Really. And the George R. Brown Convention Center is rad. It looks like a big old school steamboat. Anyway, it was such an awesome experience! We got the chance to talk to so many people and share the importance of preparedness. But also that our church isn't just scripture study, that is very important, but it strengthens you in all aspects of your life! Even when it comes to hurricanes! So we had some great experiences, not to mention I had a visitor!! It was so fun to see Amy! I guess she met Sister Chappell over by the kids table and after that Sister Chappell kept saying what a cute awesome cousin I have! It was really fun to get to see them, I can't believe how old her kids are already!

After the convention we got to go to a baptism! It was for one of the people that the Elders in our ward had been teaching and we got the chance to get to know her in relief society! She is awesome. Turns out she already knew all about the Book of Mormon stories because her parents would tell them when they were younger, but she had never learned about the church! The Lord prepares his people in the most peculiar ways sometimes! But I think the best part was after the baptism I was talking to her and asked her how she felt and she just said "VIVA!" which means alive. It was so great to see how the spirit touches people and the unexplainable joy that it brings!

After the baptism our original appointment cancelled, so we decided to visit a member! We went over and the family was there and the mom had one of her neighbors over, and so we started talking about the baptism and shared a little bit about it and her neighbor seemed really interested and we actually set up a time to have a noche de hogar tomorrow with the members family and her neighbors family!! I am so excited for that! So many miracles that happen every single day. We don't even realize a lot of them until we look back!

Well. I love this work. I am so excited for all those who are heading out this week or in a few weeks!! It is a crazy journey, but it is so awesome!

I love you all so much!

Que tengan una buenisima dia! Reemplaze miedo con fe.

Les Quiero,

Hermana Draper

Sami with her cousin Amy and her kids. They live in Houston! How fun is that?