Natasha's Mission Letter: Weekly

Hello! Did you all enjoy conference? I did!

 

This last Tuesday we had interviews with President and Sister Smith! This time when I went I received my half-way letter. When I first came out to the field the missionaries wrote a letter to themselves then gave it to Sister Smith to give to us when we hit 9 months. When she gave that to me I was like, "Uh what? I've been out for like 2 days..." Sometimes it feels like I've been out for a billion years and sometimes it feels like it's been 2 days.

 

Friday we had dinner with a Part member/less active family. It started off a little rough (awkward), but then their son brought out a deck of cards and started showing us his magic tricks. Then I was able to blow his mind with one of my magic tricks I remembered from when I was a kid. heh heh 

 

Saturday and Sunday we had general conference! Which if general conference was a holiday, it would be my third favorite holiday coming after Christmas and Thanksgiving. I loved all of it. I've always liked Conference, but it's really cool to listen to conference being a missionary. As I was listening one thing that stood out to me is that we really are in the last days before the second coming. So many times it was mentioned that we need to prepare ourselves and be spritually strong so we can fight against the advesary. President Nelson took my breath away when he said at the end of his talk, "Time is running out." 🤤 It made me realize even more that I need to apply the Atonement more in my life. It also made me realize that I need to try even harder to bring people closer to Christ because "Time is running out." 

 

Going along with President Nelson's comment I noticed all the times the second coming was mentioned and how we have to prepare ourselves for it and that it's coming super soon. To be honest that kind of stressed me out a little bit, but I was reading this morning in 2 Nephi 23 where it talks about the destruction of Babylon and how there will be a similar destruction before the second coming. I was reading with the Book of Mormon student manual and it quoted a scripture in D&C 38:30 which says, "If ye are prepared ye shall not fear." That brought a little peace to me and I realized that if we're prepared we don't have to fear. It doesn't matter when the second coming comes, it only matters that we're ready.

 

I also really loved the last two talks of conference, Elder McKay and Elder Rasbands talks. I really liked when Elder McKay said that the Lord may not immediately deliver us from the hard things we're going through, but He will immediately bless us with peace and save our sinking souls just like He did with Peter.

 

I liked how Elder Rasband talked about making our homes fortresses against Satan and how our testimony of Jesus Christ can be our own personal fortress.

 

Well not too much happened this week except for conference. Love you all! Hope you have a good week!

 

Love,

Sister Schouten

 

PS 

We literally took no pictures this week. sorry. But lets get real, we're all suprised I've taken as many pictures as I have on my mission because you all know how much I love taking pictures...