He is the Gift

Happy Thanksgiving!!

I hope you all have a happy day filled of many blessings being counted :)

Gratitude is such a powerful thing and it truly is a gift of the spirit. Thursday morning was relief society and President Harmon (in the mission presidency) shared with us some fun facts about thanksgiving and where it came from. Fun fact, Nephi actually talks about the first thanksgiving in 1 Nephi. You should go check it out.

1 Nephi13:11-13

It talks about Christopher Columbus but then it also talks about the Puritans, or the pilgrims who came over on the Mayflower. Nephi was so cool, I'm pretty sure that he just knew everything.

For Thanksgiving in the morning we were in guest services until the afternoon and then we were picked up by a sweet family who lives in Bountiful who offered to feed us. It was fun to be with a family. The food was delicious, I think food just automatically tastes better when you didn't have to cook it.

We were only there for a the afternoon and then we came back to the square to work. I always love coming back to the square after being away from it for a while because it is such a "at home" feeling the second we walk on. If I could live on the square I definitely would.

The rest of the week was so fun and busy as always. We had a little snow which was pretty, but still not enough to stick. Besides the days that it snowed the weather has been pretty warm, no need for a jacket which has been nice. I would love for it to stay like this all winter long. Of course every time I run into someone from Utah they always like to remind me that it is very unprobable for that to happen. But hey a California girl can dream right?

So has anyone seen anything the church is doing called "He is the Gift" I am super excited about it. Today is the day that everything is really coming out. On Tuesday we had training in the morning for the He is the Gift initiative and someone from the missionary department came down and showed us all the amazing things the church is doing this next month for Christmas. For one they bought the big, first screen thing on YouTube (don't really know what to call it. But if you go onto YouTube you should see a giant red banner with Mary and Jesus) They also bought tons of billboards in New York City. They have completely redone mormon.org and come out with a new video. It is so cool to see everything that the church is doing. They have also redone a lot of the North Visitor Center. Put in beautiful pictures from the Bible videos and redone one corner entirely, they added in a TV screen so that we can play the video for guests. They also have a new hashtag #SharetheGift.

So I invite all of you to go check out mormon.org and share everything with the new hashtag.

Also they have made a ton of new videos that are cute, informative, and short that we have been able to send to a lot of our investigators to watch.

http://beta.mormon.org/beliefs/jesus-christ.php#what

This is one of my favorites, it's only about a minute-go check it out :)

But really, this initiative is so smart. The title "He is the Gift" has really made me think these last few days. How often do we get caught up in the business of the holidays and really forget the reason for the season. Even more, do we forget what the greatest gift we have ever been given is? Or even who gave it?

Every single thing that we teach from Preach My Gospel goes back to the fact that we have a loving Father in Heaven. We have Christmas because we have a loving Father in Heaven. Everything is because of Him. Christ is our Savior, and the atonement is the greatest gift that we could ever be given in this life. It is a gift that will allow us to live with our Heavenly Parents for ever. Who could ask for more than that? But how many people in the world don't know that or have forgotten that? What could we do this holiday season to help remind ourselves and those around us of this amazing gift that we can access everyday. Even better what could we do to give a gift back in return?

As for the missionary work it is going great. We have been able to find so many wonderful people and have been getting them in contact with local missionaries as soon as we can. It is so much easier when we do that because we have so many people who we are looking after and teaching it is just less stressful when we know that there is another set of missionaries also looking out for them. Tomorrow one our our investigators who we just met a few weeks ago is getting baptized! We will be able to skype it, and I am so grateful, we are blessed with so much cool technology that allows us to do that. We found her on chat and she shared with us that she found a Book of Mormon while cleaning out her Father's house and didn't know what to do with it. She wasn't religious at all but she came onto chat to talk with us. She is so sweet and I just love every time we get to call her. I am so grateful for my mission. I love that we are able to stay in contact with so many wonderful people that we meet from all over the world. It's like I get to travel the world without having to go anywhere.

The lights will be turning on tonight which means madness and miracles start tonight.

I hope you all had a wonderful weekend with family and friends!

I love you all!

XOXOXOXOX

-Sister Fluckiger