Transfer Meeting

Hey mom,

So this email is going to be super weird! So not necessary important to put most of these in the blog haha. I just wanted to tell you everything!

This week has been the most stressful, successful, blessed, and miraculous week ever.

Let's start with Monday night, shall we? We have always been teaching Chrissie over the video phone, never in person. So it was our first time to visit with her this week in her own home! #Miracles! We started to teach her and then all the sudden Ken was involved in our discussion. Pretty much Chrissie asked questions and learned. Ken asked different questions and learned too. We were teaching two completely opposite lessons but we were teaching according to their needs. It was crazy and miraculous because remember that Ken is normally trying to pull Chrissie away from the church and it seemed prayers were answered and his heart was softened. Ken was agreeing to everything we were teaching him. Chrissie wanted to get baptized. Ken said, "Do everything you can to prepare yourself for baptism." Sister Passey and I were pretty much shocked. We expressed our gratitude to The Lord. Sister Passey said a closing prayer, while she was praying, I saw a mini vision of Pana and John dressed in white and they had a huge smile on their face. It was incredible to see and it motivated me to keep working hard.

One of a laughing and weird experience I had was at Chrissie's home. She had this one family picture of Ken with his ex-wife and two kids and with Chrissie and her kids. It was like a professional photo shoot. Awkward....

Tuesday, Transfer meeting came along, we saw all the departing missionaries sing, "I Know That My Redeemer Lives." So many great missionaries are leaving us tomorrow. I saw Sister Johnson on the stand singing. She looked at me, I looked at her and we both smiled so big. I am proud of her! She finished her mission strong. I felt like she has truly loved me and that she was proud of me. I then saw her almost start crying which made me shed a tear or two. I'm gonna miss her.

 

Sister Wang

 

                       Sister Johnson

 

 

Transfer call came along. We were put in a trio with Sister Kelsey Layton. We were so excited!! Funny story about Sister Layton. She has always wanted to be my companion ever since I came into the field. She even wrote President Calderwood ten reasons why we should be companions. What's with people and their dying wishes coming true haha. Sister Layton and I met on Facebook shortly before I left. She is from Centerville, Utah. When she was five, her hearing started to decrease and at the age of 12, she was completely deaf and received one cochlear implant. No one except for her family found out she was deaf until she was in college. She never knew sign till she came out on her mission. She is a really good missionary. I am lucky to be with her at this time.

 

Transfer was over, I said goodbye to all my previous companions, Sister Wang, Sister Hironaka, and Sister Johnson. Sister Johnson is already excited to have me home haha, she doesn't think she is waiting that long for me.

 

The Chinese district is ready to have me back in three weeks. Elder Chung spoke Chinese to me and I understood everything he was saying to me and responded back in Chinese and he was impressed. I am so nervous to train in Dyker. I know I will be fine as long as I trust in the Lord to guide me by the hand. #Faith

 

Oh my, I cannot believe I hit the one year mark. It's insane and guess what?!? I got super sick on my year mark! Great memories to have haha. I did nothing special that day but it was fun!

We got bible bashed hard last week. Interesting times!

We called one of our potentials, Kit Kat. Our district leader went knocking two months ago and found Kit Kat and received her number. We couldn't get in touch with her till last week. She talked to us for like an hour straight. She acted like she knew us.

Kit Kat, Pana, John, Chrissie, and the Sorace called us and told us that one of their dear friends, Steven Bruno, had died at age of 46. He had a seizure. Kit Kat invited us to his funeral. Well.... It was the most successful and a drama deaf finding ever!

Before we left to this funeral, we looked at each other and we were wearing bright colors and we were like.... Ummmm...... We need to mourn too. So we changed to dark clothing and we went. The funeral home was 2 minutes away. We parked.... And we sat.... Debating whether we should go or not.... Ended up going and it was good. So we met Steven in a casket. He is a very popular guy. So many people were there. There was two wakes going on for Steve Bruno. One from 2-4 and the other one was from 7-9. We went to 2-4. We saw Chrissie, Ken, and his ex-wife. We saw Pana and John. We also saw The Sorace. It was 4 and Michael Sorace felt the strong impression that we needed to come back at 7. We hesitated and then we accepted. 

While waiting for the other wake to start, Chrissie invited us to eat dinner with her, her boyfriend Ken, and Ken's ex-wife, Annemarie. It was the most awkward dinner ever. Annemarie wants to be taught the gospel and she really likes me and was introducing me to a few people at the wake.

We went back to the wake and met sooooooo many people. There were hundreds of deaf people. Deaf radar is going off!  We met Kit Kat for the first time in person and she is pretty cool but weird too. Weird, why??? Well. She was introducing herself, and her family and we met her ex-husband (whom she is still in love with), and her boyfriend. She has another boyfriend but he was not there. It was like reverse polygamy. So weird. She has this Sorenson profile picture and it contained her and her three men. Law of Chastity may be a little difficult to teach with Kit Kat and Chrissie. Funny story about Chrissie and Kit Kat..... They pretty much hate each other so wish us a luck.

Also at the Wake, Pana was sooooo excited to see us. She started yelling for people to introduce them to the Mormon missionaries. She was like, "Meet the mormon missionaries. They are sooooo awesome. They help me with my paper work. They help me with my family tree. They can do anything for you." John was like, "I love the Mormon missionaries! They are the best!" So yeah, we met a few of their friends and got their information. Also we met people who we have been teaching on the video phone and never met in person. It was cool.

Remember that Pana and John never come to church on time because of tap water? Well we taught them about the sacrament Saturday night and told them that they were not required to take the sacrament when they are not a member and then guess what happened?!? Pana and John came to church for the first time early! They were able to have a spiritual experience in sacrament. Yes!!! Lots of miracles!!! 

So the real interpreter didn't show up yesterday for church so.... I got to interpret. It was fun and so interesting that the whole deaf group fell asleep :) I am so awesome!

On Saturday we met with Sister Betancourt. She said she had a confession.... So we told her to tell us. She said she has a problem with smoking. So Sister Layton said, "Give us your smoke pack." Sister Betancourt gave up one pack but had a hard time giving the other one away. I said, "You can slowly decrease your addiction by smoking less and less and less." She wanted to do that so we are going to keep her accountable! I really love her.

Yesterday, many people were coming up to me saying that they will miss me when I am gone. They said, "This is not an actual goodbye.... When you leave, come to me and give me a hug!" Awwww. Sister Betancourt was pouting... I asked what's wrong. She said she will miss me. I said, "You got other good missionaries that can help you!" She said, "But it's not the same thing." She gave me a big fat hug. I'm gonna miss her! 

So we got a not contact referral, Daniell. we showed up and she was surprised to see us and said she never ordered anything. We asked if she had mormon friends. She said she was in Utah last summer and had a partner in Health Coach who was a mormon who just probably referred her to meet with the missionaries. She was interested in learning about the church and so we are super excited to meet with her on Thursday! So main point of this... All you mormon people need to refer non-mormon people online and get missionaries to meet with them.  It's actually not a scary thing. Haha!

Spiritual experience for myself. So pretty much, attitude is everything. It's honestly hard for me to be in a trio. It's really hard so I felt like I haven't been teaching or was needed here. I felt like I was not their companion since whenever I talk they don't listen. Half of the time, I don't know what I am doing because they don't really tell me or answer my questions. They have been companions before so it's understandable. But then it started to hurt me. I felt alone. I was being negative. It was hard. But then I decided to pray and ask for peace and change my perspective. I started reading some things in the gospel library and it helped so much. I am, changing my perspective and attitude and I feel a lot better. I am grateful for that experience so I can learn and be able to help others who are in the same situation and help them rely on Jesus Christ for help. It's awesome! The Savior truly does love us! He wants us to humble ourselves  and strive to be more like him. We have those weaknesses but those weaknesses help us learn how to be humble and find ways to make it our strength through the Lord's power and guidance. I love this gospel. It's peaceful to know how amazing God's plan is!

I love you mom! With all of my heart!

Love

Sister Moore