Well I guess God did!

Dear Mom and Dad:

It was so nice to hear from you!  I actually did get mail this week!  Grammie sent an awesome letter about her conversion, Amy sent something, and I got a letter from Danica too!  She's training and doing really well.  She says the mission is changing her so much and she's discovering who she really is, which is just awesome!  I so needed her letter!

And I did get the vitamins.  I already have a multi vitamin that I try to take everyday.  Sister Mondelli says that it's not a good idea since both vitamins have some of the same vitamins in them and it's not good to "overdose" on vitamins.  Does that make sense?  She said to take one, one day, and the other the next day.  And I trust Sister Mondelli's opinion.  She's a college graduate in Crime Investigation and she is a science math type of person.  She's just smart all around.  Me on the other hand?  "A really good book you would like is, ‘I'd Tell you I Love you But Then I'd Have To Kill You.' "  Not very useful info.

And the only reason I went to the hospital was because all the doctors offices were closed.  And yes, I'm taking that stuff (I don't know what it's called).  And Dad, raw veggies really aren't my favorite...can I at least cook them or something?

I'm glad y'all had fun in Mexico.  I want to hear all about it!  And what about Elder Ostler?  What's up with him?  He didn't tell me anything in his email about transfers.

But yes, I'm feeling a lot better, most of the time.  I can't eat a lot, especially being in this heat, or else I’ll start to not feel good.  But I'm really tired of all this, just cuz I'm so emotional.  Monday I was so happy, and it was a great day.  Tuesday night I was bored out of my mind while talking to this one guy, and then that night at Stacey's, was depressed and felt like crying!  So went home and ate a whole bunch of chocolate pb m&ms.  What the heck is wrong with me?  I think I just might have to live this out, work hard, and not worry about it, then things might go back to normal, but I won't count on it.  I don't know, but I do know that the Lord blesses those that diligently serve Him!

Sister Clark came back, and we had dinner at the Hokansons.  Oh the Shepherds Pie was sooo good!  So reminded me of home!  And Sister Clark and I talked about life after the mission, and how I'm worrying about some school stuff, and how I just need to leave it in the Lord's hands, and when the time comes for me to decide some stuff, then He'll let me know.  She told me how she was worried about some stuff too, but on her trip here some stuff worked out for her.  So I just need to work hard now and worry about that other stuff later.  Talking with Sister Clark was amazing!  She's so amazing!  We're different missionaries, that's for sure!

Transfers are next week, and I think I'm getting booted.  I hope I go to the city!  That would be so fun!   I could do so much more on pday rather than go to Valpo!  But I’m gonna miss Rensselaer!  Sister Mondelli doesn't want me to leave cuz I'm her GPS.  She would be a good missionary here, but I think she would do better in the suburbs.  She loves tracting, and there's not a lot of places to tract here.

So a fun adventure we had this week!  We were tracting in Roselawn, way up north, and this old couple invited us in (he was born in the late 20s) and the first thing that popped out of my mouth was "Can we do anything for you?"

"This house is a mess!"  the old lady, Barbra said.

"Well we can help you clean it!"

So she put us to work in the bathroom!  Of all places the bathroom!  Sister Mondelli cleaned houses for a living at one point in her life.  She was good with it.  She took the shower, and toilet, I did the sink, made the bed and swept!  It was great!  And hot.  They were very thankful.  We shared a message with them, said a prayer and left.  Great experience though!  I'll never forget it!  Eventually the old man asked if someone had given us their name.  Well I guess God did.

I've found that sometimes God places us in peoples paths that aren't ready for baptism at that time, but need something else, a message on Christ, a hug, a word of encouragement, a bathroom cleaned.  Whatever, He places His missionaries there cuz there's not a lot of members in this area.

Later that day we gave marriage counsel to one of our investigators.  She's prolly your guys’ age and been married for 2 years.  Oh how this gospel will help both of them!  But I doubt he'll accept it.  He's not a church person.  I hope she accepts it though!  We also met someone who believes that we lived before we came here and Satan and Jesus are brothers!  But that Bible is more of just a guide...whatever!

One investigator ended up in the Lafayette hospital this week.  They thought he was having a heart attack.  But he wasn't.  He's on a lot of meds now, and he quit smoking!  Well he was forced to.  He was in the hospital for fourishcuz I’ve been saved."  How often I want to, as Jackson would say, condemn them!  Or keeping the sabbath day holy.  I don't need to go to church to worship God.  Um. . . yes actually you do!  It's two fold.  Personal worship at home, prayer, scripture study, service, etc, and going to church to strengthen one another and of course the sacrament!  People these days really need to listen to a prophet!

So we visited Cindy again this week.  Guess what?  When we went over there she said she had found a BOM in her house!  We hadn't given her one cuz she said the print was too small, so she was reading it on the computer.  She showed it to us and it was a quad!  At first we were like, "Awesome!"  Then we were like, "Cindy has a quad!  Crap!" But she's reading now and has questions.  Ridiculous questions, but still.

The last lesson was cool cuz I used Harrison as an example of being positive through a trial.  We were talking about how we need to be happy in life even when things don't go our way.  She couldn't argue that what Harrison had gone through was easy, and that his positive attitude was fake or that he didn't know what was going on.  It was really awesome to use my own brother as an example of someone LIVING the gospel!

We also met with this guy our age who's thinking about going into the "Priesthood"  like in the Catholic priesthood.  He asked us questions about our religion, and oh man the Spirit was with us, cuz there were several times that he didn't have anything to say back.  Like one time he said, "In your religion praying to Mary and the Saints is a no, no?"  And I very simply and fervently said, "The first commandment is that we should have no other Gods before Him, and Christ instructed us to pray to the Father in His name." He went off on how he liked praying to the saints and what not.  Whatever.

But this other time he couldn't get off the fact that Joseph couldn't be a prophet because of polygamy.  We abandoned the BOM approach cuz he wasn't getting it, and Sister Mondelli brought up Abraham and Jacob and how they had multiple wives.

Then I came in and quoted Isaiah 55 and said, "We don't know the ways of God.  Why did Jacob have four wives?  Why?  We don't know.  God's ways are higher than our ways.  We don't know why He tells us to do certain things, but they're all for a reason."  Yeah, he didn't have anything to say about polygamy after that.

At one point he brought up Padre Pio who bleed from his hands and had a wound in his side and was like, "He performed miracles and was like Christ."  Later Sister Mondelli and I were like, well that’s blasphemy!  There is but one Christ!  And he also said that Peter was the first pope!  We almost laughed out loud while we were talking to him about that!  We let a lot of false doctrine slide when we're talking to people cuz we know that the BOM is the key to squelching it.

We had an investigator, Celso say, after L1 that he needed to know if this was true so that when he got to Heaven and it was true, God wouldn't say, "I gave you the chance to know if this was true and you didn't take it."  It was cool!  His wife only reads the bible, but we think she'll read the BOM too with her husband!

Okay, it's past time!

The pics!

S'mores at Stacey's

I love you all and miss you too! 

Tell Miss Leda I love her!  She served well, I'm sure of it!

Love Sister Ostler