I'm Going to Build a Boat!

Hi everyone!

The Mission life just gets crazier and crazier! I know that Heavenly Father does it to me on purpose. Every time I think "I've finally figured this out" or "I've got this down finally" Heavenly Father gives me something else. Gotta love a challenge! :)

So many things happened over the past two weeks though! We had transfers last week which is why I missed a week of emailing. My schedule has changed and in about a week it will change again because we will begin the Christmas schedule! Yay! We walked out of the Church Office Building today and we saw that they have started setting up the nativities. "It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas" here on Temple Square! 

I have a new companion again! She's from Brazil but moved to the States when she was a kid and grew up in Atlanta, Georgia! 

Sister Nogueira - the red head on the right :) We are having so much fun together and we get to teach a bunch of Brazilians! This photo was taken at the Roof (a really great restaurant on the top floor of the Joseph Smith Memorial Building. We were able to accompany the departing class to the Temple and then onto lunch with President. Being in the Temple once again was wonderful. President has called me back to serve in the mission office and I'll be there for the rest of my mission and I'm grateful for the opportunity to serve him and to serve with him but I'll admit I was a little hesitant because I knew that it would cut into my teaching and proselyting time. Of course put on top of that the normal feelings of inadequacy - the Temple was a great place to go afterwards to be able to receive some answers. While I was there I read in 1 Nephi about when the Lord called Nephi to build a boat. It blew my mind that Nephi didn't even question...well he did but his question was "where can I go to find the materials to make the tools to build a boat?" What faith he had. I definitely had a change of heart about my new assignment. The Lord truly can do whatever He wants - with Him everything is possible so why wouldn't He be able to use us as His children, despite our weaknesses. 

Speaking of Nephi, this morning we had our Missionary Leadership Council to begin the new transfer and Sister Nogueira and I trained on the difference between achieving and becoming. It was such a wonderful experience for both of us because our goal was to teach only from the Book of Mormon. We accomplished that by reading the story of Nephi and Laman and Lemuel and in the middle of the story we would act out different things about how the different reactions related to how we as missionaries react. It was great! Laman and Lemuel were the perfect example of a missionary who achieved their mission. Actually if you read the story again of when they went to get the brass plates you would see that they would obedient and what the Lord had asked them to do. They weren't happy about it of course but they did it and achieved. It's sad but we sometimes sees that happen within our missions, being a missionary just becomes a checklist of things that we need to do instead of us allowing the mission to help us become more like our Savior. It went really well! The sisters especially liked when we acted out the part where Laman comes back from the first attempt and he's all frazzled because he almost just died - I wish someone would have videoed us :)

If you hadn't figured it out yet, this week was filled with meetings! We've had one every day so far. It's so busy for a few different reasons: the Christmas seasons starts next week, this is only a 5 week transfer, and President is getting ready to finish his mission. It's a good thing that Sister Nogueira and I really like a challenge. 

It's been a huge goal of ours though to still be able to have a good teaching area and we know that the Lord will help us out. We have been able to see a few miracles the past few days that we have been companions.
Something that we have been talking a lot about actually that has helped us set some goals this transfer has been talking about our Father in Heaven's home up in heaven. I shared with my companion how Mom always says that there isn't going to be "any empty chairs at my dinner table". That's what our Father in Heaven wants too! We are focusing on filling more of those chairs as our Christmas gift to Him this year.
One of the ladies that we are teaching I was able to find last week actually. She just called in and told me that her son was baptized into our church a few years back and now she knows that she is ready to learn more and meet with missionaries. How cool is that?! She's a really sweet lady and I know that this is an answer to her son's prayers. 

Another cool miracle happened yesterday while we were in the North Visitor Center - a lady came up to us and simply asked us for a copy of the Book of Mormon. She shared with us how she had talked to some sisters earlier, actually like 2 or 3 sets of missionaries, about it but now she wanted a copy. We were able to teach her more about the Book of Mormon and how it can have an righteous influence on her life. Now we are going to happily teaching her more about the restored gospel! 

Being a missionary is just so fun! Especially in this mission! This week I was able to try Brazilian tea (it's herbal I promise!) It actually wasn't that bad. I think my companion was disappointed because I guess other Americans are really dramatic when they try it for the first time and I wasn't. Oh well, I can check that off the list of things I need to try.

I love you all so much! The Gospel is true and it changes life, it has changed mine for sure!

XOXOXOX

Sister Fluckiger