Week 5

My beautiful family! How is everyone?

 

Another week has gone by. Where has the time gone?! Can't believe I have been out for over a month now. Time really does fly when you are serving the Lord. (that should be the new saying) But, I have been loving every second of it! There is nothing like a mission! I am so blessed to be here in Colorado Springs and to serve the wonderful people here. 

So let's see what has happened this past week...

We met with S. on Wednesday and he is coming along. The language barrier makes it a little bit more difficult for him. But he comes to church every Sunday and we sit with him in gospel principles and he is eager to learn. He knows so much already but we think that he is doubting his knowledge because he doesn't know everything. But he just needs to work on the faith and the knowledge that he does have. We are meeting with him again on Wednesday and I want to share with him the talk "You know Enough" given by Neil L. Andersen. I was reading it in personal study a few days ago. In his talk he taught “Our spiritual journey is the process of a lifetime. We do not know everything in the beginning or even along the way. We first build a foundation of faith in the Lord Jesus Christ.” First, we need to have faith and that is part of my purpose as a missionary. To help others build their faith. And when we do have that faith we need to act upon it. It is so important that we act and are not acted upon! He is a great person and we are hoping he will want to be baptized soon! He is so ready! 
 

We also met with T. again and we taught him about the priesthood and the program Duty to God. We printed out some activities for him to work on until we see him again on Thursday. He is so smart and he wants a better relationship with God but he just needs to come to church. He's a great kid! Not to mention they have a really cute puppy...

 

Sister Mangisi and I really want to get to know our ward better so yesterday at church we decided to sit separately with our ward members (don't worry we always stay within sight and sound of each other...haha) and the difference it made was incredible. We were able to meet twice the number of people as we would have if we would've sat together and only talked with ourselves. It was a great experience for both of us with talking with the awesome members in our ward and getting to know them better. 

 

I love the people of Colorado Springs. They are all so wonderful! We have been asked in our mission to study the talk "What If Love Were Our Only Motive?". It was a Devotional given at BYU two years ago by Russell T. Osguthorpe. It is seriously an amazing and inspiring talk! I would encourage all of you to read it and study it together. He asks the questions: what if love were our only motive? What if everything we did was out of love? And the more I think about it and apply it to my mission, the more possible it seems to do everything out of love. Love is the two greatest commandments. We need to love God and we need to love others. While on my mission, I have been trying to see everyone through God's eyes and it really has helped to learn to love those around me. I have been striving to have love be my only motive because it is that love that the people who meet me will feel even before I open my mouth. I want people to feel the love that Heavenly Father has for them emulating through me. Love CAN be our only motive if we pray for help and as we serve others. 

I love you all so much and I am so grateful for each of you. When I tell everyone I have five sisters and no brothers they all say "oh your poor dad." But I just say no, he's lucky and he knows it :) Thank you for being such wonderful examples in my life and for supporting me! I miss you all and pray for you all daily.

 

xoxo

Sister Peterson 

Kyra's candy drawer! Of course...she is a Peterson after all!