Selamat Natal & Tahun Baru!

well it was so fun to talk to everyone on sunday, it seriously just put me in the right mood....not that i've had much here in malang that doesn't put me in the right mood, but i loved getting the updates and especially planning for march :) and yet it's getting just too close....

anyways....so it's been a week. sunday we went to Bro Jon's house (the same one sis rhondeau talked about), cuz his son wanted the missionaries over for a "fruit party" - so we went, and after we got there, sis peggy's entire family showed up....3 of her 4 siblings, and her mom. from what i'm getting with the stories, the sisters first met bro paulus and his mom, taught them the first lesson, and then their mom and her youngest son went back to bali, where they live....and then from bro paulus, somehow they got connected up with sis peggy. anywho...i'd talked to elder meek about what i was planning on doing with bro paulus (he wants to stop smoking, and he has questions about the priesthood....what better match is there to help him understand the priesthood AND stop smoking?!?!), and elder meek took the opportunity to talk about the priesthood, and the apostasy, and why joseph smith is so important...but then it kinda just opened a can of worms with bro paulus (now i know why it's better that the sisters go over there...he's not as forceful -or rude- with us as he was with elder meek), and that got the youngest brother involved, until we basically just left feeling like we'd only worsened the situation between their family...so yesterday we (the sisters) went to where peggy's mom was staying to help her feel more at peace with us, and especially to ask us any questions that she might have. altho everyone else basically just stayed away from us, peggy's mom and bro paulus talked to us the whole time, and we left feeling a lot better about things. she DID have a few questions they wanted to ask us, and so we got a lot of her misunderstanding out of the way...however, she's still not all that interested in the church. but at least she can support peggy a lot more.

we just got back from an appointment (our pday is on saturday this week...) where the mom hasn't eaten since yesterday, and her little daughter hadn't eaten since she ate just a tiny bit of rice this morning. man alive....it's things like that that just make me wanna cry here. the worst part was, we went to go buy some food, but she wouldn't let us....she said she just needed a friend, someone to pray with, and we had done our part. holy crap...this lady has 4 daughters, the 3 oldest work, her husband does who knows what (she said he goes out searching for money all day, and yet he rarely gives her money for food), and the 3 oldest give what they make to their dad, not their mom....so where all that money goes, i have no idea (but i HAVE heard he likes to drink...), but they just sleep in their tiny little one-room shack all day, cuz they have no where to go, and if she goes anywhere, the mom hates making people feel like they hafta give her food....oh, and i forgot to mention that she's forbidden to work for other people. so she has no way to get money, basically, for her and her daughter to eat. seriously...it's ridiculous. most of the time, people ask me for money, and i just automatically get turned off, but with her....i was OFFEREING her food, but she wouldn't take it. crazy crazy...we taught her to pray and read the scriptures to know how to overcome this, and that she needs to think more positively. ugh...it's hard to see people like this.

and....i dunno who i'll be visiting come next week. friday, my new comp is on her way to malang, straight from the philipines MTC. her name is sis sari, she joined the church in Hong Kong, is 27, and fairly tall. she's from the solo/jokja area. i met her while i was in Jakarta on my way here (she was getting ready to go to the philipines), and she seemed pretty cool. i'm hoping we get along...not gonna lie, i'm pretty nervous about being a trainer, but i'm hoping she'll help me stick with a good schedule. i'm REALLY hoping she'll get up in the mornings so i can go running....ugh, i miss running so much. anywho...we'll see! but i'm also excited to be in charge (not the jr comp for the first time...) with someone who i can help shape, and who can help shape me. it'll be a good 2 months, i think :)

oh, and i asked pres for bikes for the sisters here in malang (i'm sick of angkots and walking far, and only getting a few appointments a day when we COULD get more), and he's pretty sure that'll be ok! so i'm FINALLY gonna get to ride a bike! i told sis lie, i'm not gonna make it to solo (they have bikes there), so i'm bringing all that i want from solo to me here malang :) haha. oh, did i mention that i ate dog yesterday?

anywho...it's been a biasa week...nothing too extraordinary, except that there have been a lot of people in the hospital (one with a high fever, another who got splashed with burning hot water....ya, her face did NOT look that good....), christmas was good, i ate too much, sis lie told me yesterday that my stomach is getting big (i told her greg is back...and that she needed to go running with me in the morning, but she said she liked me better with greg than without....ugh), i'm old now....like, seriously, i feel like an old lady, but whateverlah...and ya. i'm just happy to be here in malang, and it's fun getting to know the branch members.

and that's about it. i love you all! thanks for everything, enjoy the new year, don't party too hard, go to bed at a decent time, and remember...the Holy Ghost goes to bed at midnight :P haha. loves!

~Sister Hewlett

Sara's return date...

Just to let you know...

Sara completes her mission March 1st

and will be returning home with my parents the 11th!

Ee....GROSS!!!!

ok, so this week has been pretty good, i feel a bit more productive, but can still certainly improve is several areas. I FOUND MY NEW PAK SIREGAR HERE IN MALANG! seriously....sooooo cool. his name is pak paulus, but i've already started calling him bro. paulus, cuz i know it's just a matter of time for the guy. he's so intellectual, he has such a view of whats wrong in organized religion, and yet still understands the need for it....and is just FUN! and he speaks like a preacher, which just adds to why i can compare him to pak siregar. they're just fun people, people like that who will listen to what we have to say and try to digest it. however, bro paulus has one thing that pak siregar never had...a desire to know for himself, and "switch the religion that has been passed down for generations by my forefathers" if what he finds is true. HAHA, so cool. so here's the story...sis rhondeau helped a family here get baptized right before she left, and she was working with several of that family's own siblings, and bro paulus is the brother of the wife of that family, sister peggy. so....there's already a good foundation for bro paulus with family who is newly on fire, and from what i've heard, has a SERIOUS testimony about this gospel that's amazing. i just wanna build on that, and help bro paulus' own family get that testimony and make the commitment themselves. it's my new goal with the time i have left here in malang. we're meeting tomorrow to talk about the priesthood, cuz he still doesn't understand how EVERYONE can have the priesthood, since with the catholic church, only the priests and/or workers have the right to that kinda stuff (especially stuff like the sacrament and forgiving and stuff....). so i've been preparing for that, and i've found TONS of answers in D&C84....thta's a FANTASTIC section, it's been a few years since i've read the whole thing myself. but anywho...it's gonna be fun with that family, i can already tell. tell sis rhondeau i'm gonna try to build on that foundation that she's left for me :) i know she'll be happy to hear that.

so....wanna hear the GROSS story for the week? cuz that's exactly what it is. so monday morning, i'm out pruning the bushes with my new shears that i bought on saturday, and i'm all cutting happy goin at these bushes, and i'm just standing there cutting, when the next thing i know, i'm falling....and then next thing i think is, crap...i just fell?!?!?! how did i fall? and as my mind is going over all this, i finally start thinking about what i've fallen in, and i think....wait, the bathroom is right behind me, this goes toward the street.....and THAT'S when i feel the water that my feet are in....but it's not JUST water. AND I KNOW THAT. so i jump out screaming my head off for sis lie (between yelling "gross, gross, GROSS" in between), she comes out and is like what, then sees my legs, and i tell her to grab the hose FAST, and she keeps asking questions, and FINALLY gets the hose from the back, and while she's gone, i'm dry heaving cuz i smell all the crap, and it's all over my legs, and i'm just totally grossed out and just want it all off of me, and so lie finally comes out with the hose and just hoses me all down.....until all the crap from that stupid sewer line area was washed off my legs. ew. it seriously was SOOO gross. then langi comes out, and the two of them start laughing their heads off, and i'm part laughing part crying, and after i finished cutting the bush up, i went in and showered about 5 times. with LOTS of soap. then....yup, i got mad at lie for not taking a pic of me, and i took a pic myself of my scratched up legs, the hole, and then filmed the hole as i retold the story. so it WILL live on. GROSS.

so its official...i'm gonna get fat in malang. its a good thing i'm only gonna be here for less than 3 months, cuz these members are CRAZY. friday night all us missionaries (elders included) went to a sister's house is THANK GOODNESS going to malaysia to work this week, cuz dang...she made tons of food, then told us that we had to eat it all before we went home. and she was serious. WE COULD NOT GO HOME UNTIL WE FINISHED IT ALL. the elders had prob 5 portions, i had 2, the others had 3, and there was still leftovers. so....haha, i went outside to stretch my stomach, and the chunky (haha, dad, you're gonna laugh at this...the "chumly" for sure) neighbor kid was in his window looking out at the crazy bule doing weird stretches in the front of his house...and i had the spirit whisper what needed to be done...so i asked the kid, he agreed, i went inside, and without the sister knowing, i took this kid a PACKED plate of food stuffed as much as it could handle, and you should've seen the kid...he was so excited! seriously, the happiest chumly i've ever seen, possibly. all he could say was, oh thank you, thank you soooooo much! you would've thought he hadn't eaten in months. however, elder meek thinks the kid is just used to getting food when the missionaries go to this sister's house....which may be right....i'm gonna hafta ask the other sisters about that. but it was hilarious.

the other appt wasn't as bad cuz we didn't HAVE to eat everything, but it was served in courses....like a little here, a little there, each time you thinking that it's over....that there's nothing left, so eat just A LITTLE more....but nope, then comes out the next course. luckily, we were pre-warned by the elders, and so we didn't eat too much that i felt like i was gonna throw up all night. but seriously...the members here are really great, and love to invite the missionaries over. tonight we're gonna celebrate a little christmas with a member, then have another invitation for later in the week, and it's just crazy...and not all the same people. in jakarta and bandung, it was always the same people, but here it's always different...so that's nice.

anywho...i'm about outta time, so i'll stop here. but i love you all, i know it's another christmas apart, but this christmas i'm not homesick at all (haha...cuz i know i'll be home in no time :P ), and just missing not being with you...but everything else is still good. it's the most wonderful time of the year, and i'm so grateful i get to spend in with the people of Indonesia. they've taught me so much about Christ....honestly, i've learned more about Christ from muslims here, i think, then i would've EVER thought. it's incredible how GOOD these people are. anywho...i love you all, have a very merry christmas family and friends that i won't talk to sunday, but to mom, dad, kel, zak, and ben....TALK TO YA LATA!

Loves,
~Sister Sara

Selamat Datang ke Malang

well, here i am in Malang! i really do hate moving areas... having to learn a new city, trying to contact people with no idea where anything is ('where are you going?" "oh i'm going to blah-blah blah blah" "oh....right....i'm new here, so i have no idea where that is." - it's SUCH an awkward conversation...), and just following others isn't exactly my forte, but it's good. right now is the learning process, and as far as i can see, malang is gonna be a good place.

i'd heard a few rumors about the house and things going on in the branch here, but i'm still trying to figure out what's true and what's not. for example, "the house in malang is the best house the sisters live in!" ya....false. i don't think it's anything more or less than the other houses, EXCEPT that it has a little flower area in the front and side of it that was FULL of weeds when i got here. i was completely disgusted with that, so every morning i've been spending about a half hour or so weeding it out, and it looks pretty good (thanks mom for teaching me to weed :P). this morning i had more time, and after about 45 minutes sis lie and langi came out and helped me, and we talked about what we wanna plant there. hopefully i'm getting them a little more excited to focus more on the front of the house, and making sure it LOOKS like a place where Christ's servants live. not where a bunch of bums off the street live. it actually looked really good this morning, and by next week maybe i'll have it all cleared out and we can plant some new flowers (yup, it WILL take me that long, cuz there is not one piece of dirt showing....it's all completely covered in weeds).

sis lie and sis langi get along really well, which is fun for me to join in....we all get along, but i'm trying to help them focus more on contacting rather than always laughing and talking to each other while their in the angkots. i know sis langi is still new, and she still has a huge fear of talking to people (that whole language barrier that i knew so well in jakarta), but she REALLY wants to talk to people, and i've noticed a big change with her in just the last week. she got her first indonesian contact last night! so i was excited for her.

sis rhondeau was here before me, and they had a ton of investigators (got a family baptized the week before her parents got here!), and so they've turned most of those over to us...so we spent the last few days trying to get a hold of them. but the problem is, nobody's been home. i was surprised to hear that sis langi still hadn't taught a single discussion in indonesia, but monday we passed by an elder man who was weeding, and i offered to help, and that led to him asking us what church we were from, and he knew we were the Mormon church, and i asked if he'd read the BofM yet, and he said no....and the next thing we knew, we were in his house teaching the first discussion. langi was completely blown away, and nervous as could be, cuz it'd be weeks since she and lie had practiced giving the first discussion....i felt really bad (she just kept looking at me, saying "i dunno what to say..." and i tried to help her, but you can only tell someone so much to say before it's better if you just say it yourself...), and so now i'm pushing that we practice the discussions for our comp study every day. langi really is so excited and stoked about doing the work here...she just hasn't had someone REALLY showing her the way. i don't want lie to feel like i'm taking over her compship...but i also don't want us to not be effective when we teach because of something that we COULD work on, but we're too lazy to. that's not what missionary work is about. we'll see what happens with the guy (i think he thought we were going to force him to try and believe what we believe cuz he kept saying that we can't force our beliefs on him....), but it was a good lesson to learn from.

sis rhondeau and sis lily's families were here until sunday, so it was fun to be around LOTS of bules after i hadn't been around any for basically 4 months. sis rhondeau's mom has a letter for you guys...sorry you just got my package and all my pics, so i didn't know what else to send. but it's a piece of my love :)

so here's 2 stories of inactive members here that totally opened my heart last week - the first one is sis yuni, who married a muslim, but has joined the church and has a VERY strong faith in Christ and this restored gospel...but her husband has no idea. EVERYTHING has been done behind his back, because if he finds out, she knows he'll tell her she can't do it. so she basically lives a lie, solaking (praying) 5 times a day, and everything else that is islam....but when she gets time where she's all by herself in the house, she reads the BofM, and saturdays we meet in her mom's house to have a little spiritual building. SOOO dedicated, and you can feel her testimony so dang strong when you're there. her mom is muslim as well, but not fanatic (most of sis yuni's family is christian, and her little brother is even a member in jakarta), and just SOOO dang cute. she doesn't like us coming and going fast...she just wants us to chill the house with her. haha....so cute.

the other sister is sis nursiam, who is a nurse and works every single day, and takes all her holidays on sundays when possible so she can come to church, but she only gets 1 or 2 holidays every month, so she doesn't get to church much....but she said before they started these new shifts, she used to get off at 2 pm, and then she'd fellowship with the elders and sisters everywhere... she said she'd helped find TONS of people who eventually got baptized, which is totally cool. but the saddest part is that her family is all muslim, and her son (who was a member long before she was) married a fanatic muslim girl who won't let him go to church. sos poor sis nursiam is the only faithful member in her family who truly, TRULY loves Christ. sooooo cool.

anywho....so things are still new, we still don't have any REAL investigators, but we've contacted a few that are potentials, and i'm hoping this compship'll get moving more in the right direction so i'm busy busy busy here in malang! i'm sick of shopping :P but it helps a lot to have a greenie who's still fresh and excited to work. we'll see what this next week'll bring!

oh, and spiritual thought for the week is "the darkest hour always comes before the dawn" - this is my dawn, and it's only gonna get lighter from here :) i love this gospel....i'm so grateful for the testimony that i have of it. i'm grateful that i have parents who raised me with the truth and values that they were taught, and which have helped me SOOOOOO much more than you'll ever know here in indo. i know Christ lives, and i know this work is the most important work in the world...which is why i'll NEVER give up. i'll keep pushing until the end! i love you all, thanks for all the love and support....until next week!

~Sister Sara

KEBEBASAN!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

well hello hello - i'm emailing you from my hometown, jakarta! i just got here this morning, and am going around with the sisters here until my flight for tomorrow leaves for MALANG! that's right...I'M GOING TO JAVA!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! now, many people might be wondering, but you've been in java for the last year, but no no no, how wrong you are....west java is an indonesian version of america. but from what i hear, Java is where you actually see the CULTURE of indonesia. and i'm going there! i'll be in a 3-some with sis lie and sis langi (a new bule who's been here for about 2 months) until the new sisters come at the end of december. yay!!!!! i'm seriously so excited, you have no idea.....i loved bandung (the city), but it's certainly time for me to head out :)
so this last week was that...another week in bandung. sis mongan's uncle died, so she and bajodo headed to jakarta to attend his funeral (surprised? haha.... i was too, but that's my mission....) and i was with hasibuan for 2 days, and it was actually lot's of fun. hasi is an incredibly clear teacher, and is good to get the point across, and MAKE SURE they understand (i usually just talk, but she asked a lot of questions, which i liked). we taught one of my newer contacts about the Plan of Salvation, and hasi shared a scripture from the BofM (we hadn't taught the restoration yet, so she didn't know much about it except the short history i gave before they read the scripture), and ibu rosa then said, "wow...i really feel the power of this verse. this really is the Word of God. Can i learn more about it?" totally cool....so i made sure jo and i went there again before i got transferred...yesterday we went and gave the history of Joseph Smith and the BofM, but that wasn't as clear to her, i don't think. she liked the example of Joseph asking for an answer, and then receiving the answer straight from Heavenly Father and Christ (which she said, lol, "Joseph Smith was visited by 2 beings when he prayed for an answer, and i recieved 2 beings when i needed to be spiritually uplifted as well, cuz here you two are!" so cute), but i don't think she quite grasped "the only true church with the keys of the priesthood." hopefully bajodo will do a good job of teaching her and her daughter more...they live DANG far from the church, but are really cool, so hopefully. ibu rosa's daughter, tasya, almost cried when i was leaving, and gave me a bracelet with a pic of her to remember. so sweet. i love the indonesian people!
so a lot of other people i was trying to get in contact with didn't happen, so it wasn't the most exciting week...but we taught Ibu Dina for the last time, and it was a pretty good lesson about the foundation and "building" of the church. i got it from the primary handbook thing (hee hee, they gave it to us as the mtc, but i hadn't looked at it until i had to play the song for the primary program, then i noticed this...it's got some good ideas in there for investigators!), and it's where the foundation is prophets, apostles, and of course, Jesus Christ. above that, you have the Holy Ghost and priesthood, then ordinances and Revelation, and at the top is the scriptures. i think ibu dina is a little at that point of "holy cow, they are getting forceful" but then i have sis bajodo tellin her every week "we're not here to add numbers to our congregation, we're here to let people know about the BofM" so she doesn't get too offended, but then i'm thinking, "no, we ARE trying to get people baptized, and she needs to KNOW what has to be done for her to recieve these blessings"...but ya, that's my life. well not anymore...haha, i'm going to malang!
so i'm happy today, i'm going to malang! this week i've learned that God really does answer prayers, and that there really ARE people out there ready to hear this message IF THE MISSIONARIES WILL GET OFF THEIR BUTTS AND GET TO WORK! it's as simple as that, really. pres groberg this week sent out an email about how we need to start PLANNING where we're going, have a destination in mind, DO things that are worth while...not just wander from here to there. and then find people along the way! i love all that he's doing here to try and change the slump that happens so frequently. a lot of people face challenges on their missions... i've decided mine here is to NOT be able to do all that i know i can to do this work....trying to overcome other people's characteristics while trying to maintain the ones that i have that are so greatly needed in this mission. terlalu semangat untuk melakukan pekerjaan misionaris? bisa ada itu sewaktu di misi? i think not.
so that's my week! next week i'll be writing from malang! i love you all! have a great week, and enjoy getting ready for christmas! from what i've heard, malang has a more Christmassy feel to it than jakarta did last year, or even what i saw in bandung this last week. malang is like the capital city for catholics, so it should feel more like christmas this year...whether that's good or bad, i'm not sure, but either way i'm excited! i love you all, thanks for all you do for me! loves~
~Sister Sara

minggu terakhir di bandung?

well, another week come and gone - GILA!!!! and you met with steffi! isn't she great? elder subandryo said that she was there, and before i could even get the words out that you guys needed to get together, he said, "hey, she needs to meet your parents!" then he said he still had dad's email, so i'm assuming you guys heard from elder subandryo to know how to get a hold of steffi... so fun, i'm so glad that you guys get to meet the wonderful saints that live here in Indonesia so you get a taste of what who i work with here. sis steffi helped me and sis lie find inactive members when we were first put together (and had no idea how to contact, teach or anything else), and while she deals with health issues that are pretty serious, she's always just so faithful and smiling and always looking for ways to help others. it was hard to get anyone to help us while i was in jakarta, but sis steffi was ALWAYS willing. you were truly blessed to meet her.
so this last week has been another week. we got an appointment with this lady and her teenage daughter, and i was all excited to go and teach them, cuz they seem super cool and LOVED us when we met, but when we got to their house, the mom told us her story (which is good to know), and then told her daughter that she wanted her to tell us her problem with her boyfriend, and get a second opinion on how to handle it...ya, it was a long story and was basically just the usual relationship where the two aren't talking to each other, so they're all confused and crying and hurt feelings and "i think you hate me," "no, you're the one that hates me" (all thru texting, btw, which is ALWAYS the wrong way to handle fights), and i felt like i was back home talking to my friends about their boyfriends....which is FINE, i have no problem with it, but it left us with no time to talk about the restoration or anything else... just give our opinion and advice about how to handle the problem (TALK!!!!), and that was it. i think that happened cuz we now tell people we're "bembina rohani," cuz that's whats on our kitas, which basically means spiritual tutor......but missionaries PREACH....so i think that might be where they were a bit confused, but we're going back this week, and will try to actually get a lesson in this time. and possibly go earlier so we have more time. haha. i love indonesia. anywho...it actually just makes me laugh now, but at the time i was a TINY bit peeved.
saturday was quite a day...we found out that pres groberg was coming to bandung that day, and so we CLEANED....all morning. well, the indos did a lot more than i thought was needed, but the house looked DANG good afterwards. but, after that i tried getting appts, and no one even answered, but we found out that no one had cleaned the church yet (they JUST started the program here where the members clean the church, and the guy who usually organizes it was sick), so me and jo went to the church and cleaned the whole thing ourselves. it was a FULL day of cleaning, but i felt better about that than walking around a mall, so :) the other sisters picked up pres and sis groberg, and then they went to an inactives house, and after that we all met up and had dinner together. it was fun.
sunday was awesome, cuz sis groberg is SUCH a spitfire! she seriously makes me so happy....she's everything a mission president's wife should be - just so excited to go out and do the work, and working hard to try and understand the language. it's not coming as fast as she'd like it to, i know, but by the time she goes home she'll have this language down. as soon as church was over and president had interviewed us all, she was ready to go, "where are we going to go? who can we visit? we have the time, so let's get going so we can visit as many as possible!" haha, seriously, she made me so happy. it's nice to have someone else around who feels like that. so jo and i went with them and the branch president and his wife to visit one of the inactive members, and then they dropped us off to go to ibu dina's while they went to go visit others. my favorite is that they didn't have their own car or driver - they rode cititrans here (thats what we ride when we go to jakarta - it's just a direct route that they have here if you wanna go to jakarta or bandung), and then rode the angkots and walked with us - they wanted to take the angkot to go home saturday night, but sis mongan talked them into taking a taxi so they wouldn't get lost. haha. but ya...thats what i love - they're here WITH us missionaries, they want to know what we DO so they know how to help us. it was fun.
our visit with ibu dina was a bit of an eye opener for me last week - i'm seeing more and more that we've been too soft with her..she doesn't understand the restoration, and that this is GOD'S church on earth, and i tried to be as bold as i could without hurting her feelings when i told her that her baptism was not done with the Priesthood, which means it won't hold later on in Heaven.. after that, she started saying that, according to her, the guy who baptized her had the power of God, and that it's still good.....so me and jo have talked, and we have to go back to trying and explaining about the restoration again. i gave her HW this week to read from an article about joseph smith from the liahona - i'm hoping if she reads that, she'll be able to understand better the role of Joseph smith, and WHY he's so important in the Church Of Jesus Christ of LDS. it's a slow process - but hopefully we can get there.
yesterday we FINALLY just went to one of our inactive's house (i usually call, and there's always an excuse, but we haven't gone to her house yet cuz she works in the hospital as a lab tech and has weird hours), and i prayed the whole way there that she'd be there, cuz that morning had been a bit of a rough one for me, and i just NEEDED to feel the spirit and like i'd accomplished something that day - and my prayers were answered! she was there, and we had a great lesson, and she cried as she told us about her situation (married a Muslim, kids aren't allowed to come to church, got offended by a text from one of the sisters last year and hasn't come to church since), and we just invited her again to remember her testimony and come back to church. she's definitely one that needs strengthening thru the members that live around her - so i'll be talking to pres santoso this week about that. she's awesome, tho, and i was SOOO happy to finally meet her, and again was reminded that i have a loving Heavenly Father in Heaven who knows what i'm doing, and is helping strengthen me every single hard step of the way. i really am SOOO blessed.
monday night we did FHE with the family that was inactive when i first got here, but have since been active almost every single week, and sis hasibuan (we were on splits) talked about the conference talks, and how we need to keep reading those, and not just read from the scriptures, cuz those talks are SPECIFICALLY for us in this day, and are what Heavenly Father has revealed to our prophets today about what WE NEED. it chastized me a bit, and yesterday i started reading the May liahona again (we haven't gotten the november yet), and it really has strengthened me SOOO much. yesterday morning i was NOT in a good mood, and certainly didn't wanna go out or do anything, but then i read julie beck's talk about the handmaid... something like "by my handmaids ye may know me" or something like that, and there was no way i could read that talk and NOT take responsibility for what i'm here to do... and so i got up and got back to work. and MAN ALIVE am i grateful for that. i know Heavenly Father watches over us, i know he sees the hardships we suffer, and while maybe our problems aren't solved the way we want them to be or in the time we want them to be, but He will ALWAYS strengthen us to endure, and to ENDURE WELL, which means still doing what we're supposed to. i'm not sure how much longer i'll be serving here in bandung, but MAN ALIVE am i glad that Heavenly Father sent me here to use talents i never thought i'd be able to use, face problems i never thought i'd have to face, and yet still have the strength to go on and DO HIS WORK. i certainly have had my times where i'm down and it's taken a long time to get back, but i think i needed those humbling times so that i could FEEL that, and so that now i can know that i DON'T want to be like that anymore here. i told president groberg on sunday that i want to work HARD these last few months that i have, and hopefully he'll help me out with that. i know these last few months are going to be a gift from God, cuz REALLY, i should be going home next week if i hadn't gotten hurt, but there's a reason i need to be here, and i'm gonna make sure i work hard to find out what that is.
anywho...sorry, now i'm going off, but anywho i love you all, thanks for the love and support and prayers and everything else. i'm beyond blessed to have the support that i do back home - i've known that for years, but it's even more realistic here. THANK YOU! have a good week, loves~
~Sister Sara