MY DEAREST LOVELY FAMILY!
I HAVE MISSED ALL OF YOU SO MUCH! It's weird not getting at least one letter in the mail from DearElder every day. Now that I'm in the mission field, the letters being sent to the MTC address or the mission home will take a while to get to me.
You can now send me mail to my new home:
2473 S. 700 E.
Salt Lake City, UT 84105
It's an awesome house! It was made in the 1890's. :) So everything is all vintage. We live in the upstairs and a young family lives downstairs.. It's so weird not hearing from you for a week. I keep seeing or hearing things that remind me of you. Dad, my new companion, Sister Matteson, snores sometimes. :) It makes me happy, because it makes me feel like you're still snoring in the room next to me at night haha. Mom, I was listening to MoTab this morning, the cd that you always would put on repeat. The Pilgrim Song reminded me of how you would always sing that in your bathroom as you got ready. You always sounded like an angel. Royce, I saw a red-headed boy, and it made me think of you and how you never write me. (WRITE ME. I MISS YOU, BUDDY.) Kara, my companion reminds me of you. :) (p.s. how is Steven doing in Afghanistan? Do you and him share this email, so he can read these I send home?) Cassie, everything reminds me of you. No joke. I miss you "creeping me out" all the time. Kaylynne and Jack, Kim and Matt, when giving lessons, I always show our investigators our family picture of all of us outside the temple, and they always ask about the babies you're holding, and I proudly say that those babies are my nieces and nephew and the twins had just been sealed to you that day. :) It is so good to keep in my scriptures, because it is awesome to give them a vision of what they can look forward to if they decide to get baptized and sealed to their family for time and all eternity. I'm so grateful to be sealed to mine.
So you wanna know where I've been called to? So you know how I have always dreamt of living in a foreign place and meeting people of different cultures? Well the Lord has truly blessed me! I am serving in the KAREN PROGRAM. Just so you know, Karen is a language, and yes I am trying to learn it. I get to teach BURMESE REUGEES. AND NO I'M NOT KIDDING. It has been slightly overwhelming, but it is good to be stretched. I LOVE the people. They are so humble. they have been through so much in their lives. They used to live in refugee camps in Thailand and started coming here 3-7 years ago. Most of them never had heard of Jesus Christ until they came here. They worshipped Buddha. But now there are SO MANY here that once they heard about Christ, they turned their lives to him. We cover all of the Burmese people in the mission. They attend the Columbus Branch in the old church building here, and a lot of them are not even members of the church yet. They just want to go to church, and they know a lot of Karen people go, so it's like they go just for the social aspect and to hear about God. It is all a new concept for them, so it isn't like going to a white ward where we're all spoiled and had the opportunity of being born into the church and to grow up in a well-developed ward. When I walked into the chapel this Sunday, I laughed to myself, because (Dad) it was about as loud as the ward we went to in Anthem. The leadership in the Branch is all white, with the exception of one member of the presidency. His name is Lay Ka Baw and I'm pretty sure he is the first Karen member of the church in the world. It is so awesome to imagine what it was like 5 years ago and see how far these people have come. I am hoping that in maybe 2 years, they will be able to be organized and lead their branch (hopefully it'll be a ward by then) all by themselves.
The reason why it seems so overwhelming is because they are still trying to get on their feet. There are so many new members baptized in the branch and we have so many investigators and potential investigators. We're trying to figure out who to give new member lessons to AND find those people who the Lord has prepared to receive the gospe and be baptizedl. It seems pretty impossible to do it all, so right now we are focusing more on the investigators, as we should be, and we're hoping to have a grasp on it all...someday. I just feel bad that it is all so disorganized. I want it all to be more organized, but I don't know how. I've only been here almost a week and my trainer has only been here 2 months. With the Lord, though, we can do anything.
I have seriously learned a new aspect of the Atonement. It REALLY DOES cover EVERYTHING in life. I am so used to pushing my feelings aside if they are sad or anything negative. I have found that I really cannot do that anymore. I was doing things too much on my own. God expects to rely wholly and completely on Him. I need to use His Atonement in EVERYTHING I do. So if I feel overwhelmed here or whatever, I can no longer push those feelings aside, because they will still be there weighing me down anyway without me realizing it. Through Christ, He can relieve us from all our burdens. He makes them light. I love Him so much and have become so much closer to Him and my Heavenly Father. Them and the Spirit are my best friends. When we don't have a translator with us to teach a lesson and I feel like the people aren't understanding what I am teaching, that's when I say a little prayer and then I am filled with the Spirit and just open my mouth and let Him take over. When I feel and speak by God's power, I know they can feel it. And then I don't have to be worried if they understood or not.
Family, please be a dynamite family who helps the missionaries. They need people fellowshipping investigators, new members and less actives. Mom, thanks so much for doing that. I know you wrote me telling me how you help the missionaries and are trying to make friends and have missionary opportunities. Pray and read scriptures! I know that whenever I saw Mom and Dad do that, I felt happy inside and the Spirit filled the home. What great examples I have in my family. I love you all soooooo much!
Forever and always,
Sister LeSueur
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