October 21, 2013

Dear Family,

We had some good highlights this week! Roberto came to his wife's baptism, and then we had a lesson with them the next day! Then we had a lesson on Thursday! It was super fun because Hermana Huchendorf and I were on splits that night. I went over and taught Robert about The Restoration. I asked Veronica if she would share her experience about when she received a Priesthood blessing a few weeks ago. The next time we saw her, she said that her and Roberto had a really long conversation about how Jesus Christ has helped in his family. It was so great to hear that because I don't think that they have ever really shared about spiritual experiences before! It is so fun to see this family at church and see how they are working together to learn about the Gospel. We want to help him get the Priesthood and then hopefully we can start getting this branch off the ground! Veronica got her temple recommend this weekend. That was good :)

It is pretty interesting to see how the Spirit works in lessons. We found this man who was baptized in Mexico that moved in with one of the recent converts. We were a little surprised when we went over there! We started talking and we could tell the woman really want us to teach a lesson to him, so we did and then they invited us over for a follow-up appointment. We went over on Saturday and decided we better teach about repentance and the Word of Wisdom. We got in there and it was really awkward. We didn't know what to say, but Hermana Huchendorf asked them what they thought about when they thought of Jesus Christ. Right then we could feel the Holy Ghost come into the room. It was pretty neat because I could really feel the Spirit. The thing we have been learning is that we really have to pay attention or it is easy to miss. The longer I am here the more I realize that it doesn't matter what I teach, or how skilled I am at teaching. The Spirit of God is the real converting power that "carries the message unto the hearts of men". I am grateful that I have been taught and experienced how to feel the Spirit in my life. Thank you Mom and Dad for being such wonderful teachers and focusing so much time and energy on the Gospel. I love you all a lot!

Love,
Hermana Clark

October 15, 2013

There were some great moments this week! Veronica finally got baptized! And her husband came! And he felt the Spirit! And Veronica bore her testimony and it was amazing! The Spirit of the Lord was very strong during the program and baptism. Wow. I am just in awe. Hardly a dry eye. A recent convert came up to me afterwards (I had led the music) and said I looked so happy leading the music. Haha! That is one thing I always liked to do at home - smile ridiculously big while leading the music.

We got Veronica a Personal Progress book so that she can start working on that and strengthen her testimony! Roberto is letting us teach him, so we hope that he decides soon to join his wife in the waters of baptism! We are excited to keep teaching him. The hardest thing is learning how to teach in a short amount of time so that their 2 year old daughter, Maite, doesn't go nuts. Haha family. Gotta love it. We had family home evening yesterday and explained to them that it was completely normal that Maite was screaming and crying. Haha....

Another exciting thing that happened this week was that we put together an activity for the Spanish people in the ward and our investigators. We invited the mission president, President Eaton, to come do a question and answer session. We got in there, sang a song, said a prayer and then turned the time over to the President. We lined up a translator for him (Hermano Rivera, who is awesome. Convert of 12 years with a wife and 2 children, just offered to come to any lesson he can. Said he would even re-arrange his plans to help us out. Awesome. He is going to make a big difference, just moved in.). We all held our breath as President Eaton pulled up a chair for him and his wife and we all waited for a question. Silence. Silence. I racked my brain to think of a question to ask. Nothing. I asked another missionary. Nothing. I start praying that someone will ask a question. Perfect! Saul, an investigator, asked his question! How do we balance religion and normal life? What a great question! We talked about how as a Mormon, we don't balance normal life and religion. Normal life is religion! The Gospel of Jesus Christ is a way of life, we don't pick and choose when we decide to live like Christ.

All in all, it went well! President Eaton spoke Spanish well and he said quite a lot without the translator! We had three investigators go - Edwin, Lilia, and Silvio! I hope that they all can come along! Love you all!

Love,
Hermana Clark

October 7, 2013

Veronica is going to get baptized! We feel a little like the boy who cried wolf, but we are pretty sure this one is for reals. We fasted last Sunday that her husband would let her get baptized, and we talked to her on Tuesday and he had said she could! And we met with him on Friday and have a return appointment with him today! It was very exciting to feel the Spirit during that lesson. We were late, so we had run across the lawn, and my shoe fell off and I stepped in mud. We then got in Veronica's house and her husband was "taking a shower". He always does that right when we come.... We asked Veronica if we could come back in 20 minutes and she told us to stay and wait! So we did, and he finally came out and we had a wonderful talk about how he had seen Veronica change since she started learning about the Gospel. We asked him if he wanted that and he said "Who wouldn't?" We were thinking in our minds "Exactly!" Needless to say, the Spirit did the teaching and we just sat there. It was fun to feel like we had been the Lord's tools to help.

Lilia had a blessing on Wednesday and that was really nice. We sat there and listened. She said she felt a lot of peace. That is what we ask for her, because her life sure isn't easy right now.

One lesson I am really grateful that I am learning is the importance of a good home. So many children are suffering and they don't even know because their parents are not living in a way that nurtures their children or helps them learn correct principles. It makes me really want to create a good home for my children.

Love you all!

September 30, 2013

This has been a great week! Started off with interviews with the mission president. Those are really a pleasure and privilege. The sad news of the week is that Veronica didn't get baptized. :( Her husband doesn't want her to, and she is really trying to figure out what to do. Her desire to be baptized is very strong. It was so sad yesterday because she cried for a bit because she wants to be baptized so bad. It was amazing to see the members help her, because so many offered comfort, shared their experiences, and expressed their love and faith in the Lord. This is what the Gospel is about. "Bearing others burdens"and "comforting those that stand in need of comfort". I love the Valle family (Spanish ward mission leader). They are so good to me and so willing to serve. Hermano Valle shared his testimony in Sacrament Meeting yesterday. Half in Spanish and half in English. Lucky me, I got to understand both! He expressed his love for the Lord and his desire to do everything right that he possibly can in this life. He said he is watching and watching for the day when the Lord will come again. I was very touched. Something that has been very apparent to me the last week is the power of hearing the Gospel in your own tongue. In D & C11

For it shall come to pass in that day, that every man shall ahear the fulness of the gospel in his own tongue, and in his own blanguage, through those who are cordained unto this dpower, by the administration of the eComforter, shed forth upon them for the frevelation of Jesus Christ.


Even when I was listening to Hermano Valle bear his testimony, when he spoke in English, my heart was touched more than when it was spoken in Spanish, even though I understood every word. I want to give that to others! It really provides me with motivation to learn Spanish better. I want them to hear the Gospel the way that will help them the most. But the Spirit is still the most important thing. I know this because Hermano Valle doesn't necessarily have the best English ever. It gives me hope that the Spirit will help carry the message into the hearts of those that I teach.

A funny thing that happened this week was that Lilia came to the Womens Broadcast and told us she wanted to take Wednesday off and invite us over for cake. She didn't know if she should make tea, coffee, or chocolate cake for us. Hahaha.... time for the Word of Wisdom lesson...

We picked up Edwin again! We have felt not to go over there lately, but last night, we used up all of our back-up plans, and there were a few that were super lame. I had the thought that we should go see Edwin, so we did, and!!! His life has really stunk the last few weeks. He says he has felt especially bad to God, and then us because he did not keep any of his commitments. A lot of his friends have been inviting him to different churches, but he has felt sick going to any of them because all these friends were bashing Mormons. So he didn't go to any of them. They told him a lot of silly stuff about Mormons, like that we can have as many girlfriends as we want or if someone is already married it is totally fine to cheat. What was the really interesting thing? That morning, I had grabbed a "Law of Chastity" pamphlet for our investigator Silvio, and had the thought to grab two, which I thought was super strange. Well! I handed that pamphlet right over to Edwin! That should answer his questions! It was really exciting to see that the Lord cares about individual people. I love being here on a mission and serving my Savior. I know that the scriptures can provide revelation and answers to questions that otherwise would go unfound. I love you all!
Love,
Hermana Clark

September 16, 2013

This has been a great week! We had exchanges, and I got to be with one of the girls I really really like. :) Heavenly Father must have planned it just for me. We had some great lessons! Veronica has not been baptized yet, but we think this upcoming week! Also, this last week two more people set a baptismal date. All I can say it, the weekend of General Conference is going to be really busy! Wow! Both baptisms are scheduled for that weekend! I have been learning some neat things about The Book of Mormon. I have been noticing that even as I missionary I sometimes shy away from talking about it because people don't always want to accept it. I should be using this to my advantage! If people won't read The Book of Mormon, then they can't get a testimony of The Restoration through Joseph Smith or the divinity of the Book of Mormon! It is embarrassing that it took this long to realize.... We had a fun experience on Saturday. We went to a Marriage/Baptism. We got there and no one was playing the piano, so I hopped on and played some songs. It was so fun! I don't know what arrangements were coming out, but let me tell you - it was just flowing out. Blessings for the family :) The two people who got married have really changed their lives around. One was on drugs, the other was in jail, and now one is baptized and the other soon to follow! The more I am here, the more I realize how important agency is. We can talk to everybody on the planet, but if they don't want to change, then what we tell them isn't going to make a difference. But let me tell you this: when they do want to change, miracles happen! Lilia had the opportunity to switch her job so that she can come to work and she always expresses how much peace she feels in the Gospel.

We are really working to get the branch together. Yesterday, there were 10 women in Relief Society, and about the same in the Gospel Principle class. Little by little we are finding Spanish people to fill the branch. It is truly a miracle to see so many people fall into our laps. Really that is how we feel. The people who are ready - we don't do anything. They just fall into our laps and read The Book of Mormon. The thing we are really working on now is getting them to stay in the church after they are baptized. A lot of them come from homes where they are not supported, so they don't have any friends. Members are so important! Without a support group, a lot of these recent converts stop coming because they feel lonely and they plain don't know enough to be planted so firm as to not let their roots get pulled out. Here it come - the commitment: Will you go introduce yourself to every person you don't know this coming Sunday?
Love you all,
Hermana Clark

September 9, 2013

Hi Family!

This has been a great week! We had a referral from some the elders for an awesome family up in Muckleshoot, the Indian reservation here. We went over there and taught a lesson. The dad and son were there and really felt the spirit. We are so excited to help them learn about the Gospel! Lilia is just a jewel and we can hardly believe how faithful she is. She has a hard life, but she is willing to make the sacrifices and changes so that she aligns her will to the will of her Heavenly Father. She is a really great example to me of faith. We have also been running into a lot of Spanish members here that have never been to the temple before. We are trying to help them get there so that they can enjoy the blessings and help their ancestors enjoy the blessings of the temple as well. I love the temple! We are starting to teach Elvia's husband, Silvio. (Elvia is who got baptized last transfer). He is a good man and we can hardly wait to help him accept the Gospel. I just want them to get sealed and be a happy family :) We are hoping that Veronica can get baptized this upcoming Saturday. We just love her and her family and want her little daughter. Maite, to have the opportunity to be raised in a home where Jesus Christ is the center. One thing I have really grown to love here is our district and zone meetings. I love hearing other people share experiences and advice about how to better help the people. I love you all and hope that you have a great week! Jesus Christ wants everybody to come unto Him and partake of the peace and happiness that comes only from that source. One lady, Maria, is such a good example. She has had some ridiculously hard things happen in the last month, and when we were talking to her she said "I am not happy, but I feel peace." What a miracle. Her world can fall apart, but because she has a foundation built on Jesus Christ, she feels peace and tranquility. I love you all!
Love,
Hermana Clark

Septmember 3, 2013

Hello there!
We just got two new sister missionaries serving in our ward so that we can make a branch for the Spanish people here. THAT MAKES 6 SPANISH SPEAKING SISTERS IN THIS WARD! Wow. Unreal. There are also two English elders. If this ward doesn't get some people, that is just ridiculous. I just finished my first transfer, and am still here in Auburn with Hermana Huchendorf. We are thinking about putting together a cultural activity for the ward here and bringing some investigators. It is really interested here because the ward is a little divided because of the language barrier between the Spanish and English people. We have been bringing more members to the lessons, which is pretty interesting as we try to translate for them. It is all good :) We had to drop Edwin, but we just know he is going to be a stake president in El Salvador, so we are hoping he starts wanting the Gospel soon. I never before realized how important it is to read the Book of Mormon. We talk to all these people, and all these people who say that they don't believe in the Restoration and all that. We ask them if they read the Book of Mormon and they never did. Sad day. If they would just read! Veronica has a baptismal date for this weekend. We are hoping that it comes through. Her husband came to church on Sunday (first time ever) and then they prayed together last night to help them through the hard time that she is going through right now. Lilia is just a dream. She is the one that called us. We set up a church tour with her last week. It was the most sacred experience I have had here. We took her around the church and showed her the baptismal fount, Relief Society room, classroom for Sunday school (where we watched a short video about The Sacrament) and then the chapel. We went to the front of the chapel, where we had set up a picture of Jesus and the sacrament trays, and just looked at the Sacrament table. The Spirit was very strong there and we sang a song and she prayed. She started praying and had to stop because she was crying. She said she couldn't pray, but the member we brought (Diana) encouraged her. She did. We talked about how she wants to come to church and can't because of her job. Diana really helped her by encouraging her and I read her 1 Nephi 3:7. Her desire was so strong and we just left praying really hard that the Lord would help her find a way. It was so neat to talk to someone who does want this and is willing to follow Christ. I have met a lot of people here with great faith. I look up to them. Jesus Christ is the Savior of the World.
Love,
Hermana Clark

August 26, 2013

Life is great! I will start off with the most exciting news of the week.............ready?........... We tract a lot....... and we hand out pass-along cards...... and no one ever calls......... But on Thursday? SOME CALLED!!!! We gave this lady a pass-along card three weeks ago! We were so confused about who was calling us. She said she wanted us to come over and teach her about Jesus Christ. We asked her when and if right then was okay. She said yes! We drove to her house and talked to her. She said she has been working for the last ten years and hasn't done anything else. No one ever knocks on her door, but we did. She thought for three weeks about calling, but things always got in the way. But she decided it was finally time to include God in her life. WOW! We invited her to be baptized. She accepted, but there isn't a firm date. OH MY I LOVE HER. She works on Sundays, but we have this feeling that the more we teach her and she comes closer to Christ, her desire to go to church will and things will work out for her to come. She is so humble. With my mission president, we have been focusing on praying about and extending commitments about what our investigators need to do to come closer to Christ. We received some neat ideas today. Hopefully Edwin, our investigator that was going to get baptized, will feel the importance of the Gospel and keeping commitments. It was very weird yesterday. Edwin cancelled a bunch of lessons with us, but he said we could come over yesterday. So we invited a member, Hermano Blanco, to come with us. We need a woman to go in every house, so we invited this other lady, Marta. We went to pick up Marta (10 minutes late) and her other friend, Marcelina, was there, so we invited her. All three of these people are converts to the church. Hermano Blanco works in the temple now. We ended up getting to Edwin's house twenty minutes late and he wasn't there. We didn't quite know what to do. We got the phone out to call him, and he suddenly came home. The people he lives with had company over, so we decided to just go to the park. This was at 8:20 at night (and it was dark). We were going to read the B of M, but couldn't, and the members there ended up teaching him the first lesson again. That is what he needed! They talked to him and helped him resolve some of his concerns. I think he feels less alone now and when we left, he ended up promising us to read the B of M at work today. We didn't even ask him! He just told us himself that is what he wants to do. We are convinced he is going to be baptized and go be a stake president in El Salvador (where he is planning on moving back to next year). The members made such a big difference. All of our investigators need normal people without name tags to help them feel welcome, ask their questions, and show them how to live the Gospel in everyday life. Please go out with the missionaries!

I love you all very much!

Love,
Hermana Clark

August 19, 2013

This has been a good week! We asked one of our investigators to get baptized, and she accepted! She has a testimony of the Book of Mormon, and luck is on our side because she stays at home all day with her little 2 year old, so has plenty of time to read :) She is in Ether! Unfortunately, so didn't come to church yesterday.... We have decided to revamp our church invitations by actually teaching about the commandment of keeping the Sabbath Day holy and why we go to church. Yeah. That should help. It is funny. In the MTC I felt like "Wow. How on earth will I think of things to teach for as many lessons as people will need before baptism! There are only 4 lessons!" Little did I know. Everyday I just wish I could see the same people. It has been interesting trying to figure out how to convert people to Christ. It is definitely not enough to be converted to the church or the people in the church. I have been thinking about it a lot and really want to figure it out. I know that I do the things that I do because I love my Heavenly Father and Savior and want to be like them and keep their commandments. I try to sacrifice for them out of love and obedience. Teaching the lessons doesn't help people learn that! So what does? Now I am seeing what commitments are important. As a missionary I need to help them make habits so that they can receive those experiences that truly convert them. This is definitely not the easiest thing in the world! The Spirit testifying is truly the only thing that helps my investigators. We had a neat experience the other day. We found this family and were thinking they were just great. They are 7th Day Adventists. Well... The lesson turned a little into a moment of bible bashing (which is really interesting in the Spanish culture because they are the most polite people I have ever met in my entire life). For our return appointment, we decided that we would just drop them, but we wanted to leave them with the Plan of Salvation. We prayed very earnestly that the Spirit would be with us and decided that we would just leave if the Spirit left. What a blessing that lesson was! I watched as the Spirit testified truth to the father and he realized that he had questions that had never been answered before, such as about baptisms for the dead. We didn't bring up the Book of Mormon, so next time we are going to see if they are willing to read, and if not, we will have to leave them in the area book to be re-found when they are ready. Our sister training leader had apparently taught him before and said that we needed to be really careful because he would try to sway us and convert us. Maybe this last lesson is the last one that will happen with them for a time, but I feel good in my heart knowing that one more family has heard the truth about The Plan of Happiness. The Book of Mormon is amazing. If I ever have doubts or fears, I can read the Book of Mormon and read of the prophecies that are being fulfilled right before my eyes. It is neat to be able to witness these prophecies being fulfilled.

With love,

Hermana Clark

July 31, 2013

Dear Family,
ALOHA! I mean..... HOLA! The funny thing is, here in this ward, most people are English. Yesterday there was a Polynesian family that I thought was Hispanic. Apparently they don't speak Spanish.... My companion is Sister Huchendorf from Idaho, Ohio, and on and on. She went to BYUHawaii. Pretty cool I think! She has been here 4 months and speaks really good Spanish. She studied spanish for 3 years in junior high and a semester in college. I hope that I can get to speak as well as her. It can be a little hard in lessons because I have a hard time contributing when I can't speak, but she doesn't have any problem so she just goes at it. We have met some nice people but we need to find more investigators. I realized that when I thought about missions I always thought about missions outside of the US in third world countries. Well pretty much I am in Auburn and it is a lot like..... Logan. Hahaha. I am sitting in the car with her today (P-Day) and I am like... "So what do you do on P-Day?" She says "I am still trying to figure that out." I am thinking we need a cultural experience, but the only draw back is that the culture seems to be the same here. There aren't children starving on the streets or houses breaking down. I got an email from one of the elders from the MTC. He is in Guatamela and his baptism font broke so he had to do the baptism in the ocean! Yeah. Two different missions. The people here have been pretty nice. The coolest thing about being here is that I think my faith and conviction grows the more that I have to tell people that. It can be little scary going around talking to random people, but it has been okay. The spanish people are so much nicer. I would much rather knock on a spanish persons home than a white persons home. They are so willing to talk about Jesus. The hard thing about teaching them is that our lessons are way too long. I talked to my companion and we decided we really need to work on taking control of the conversations. She isn't very aggressive, so I sometimes feel like it is up to me, but the trouble with that is I can't say anything in Spanish. I am trying to learn how to love everybody around me and desire to share the Gospel with them. I haven't quite figured out how to successfully start Gospel conversations. I sometimes just can't think of anything to say. Or I say "could we share a message with you?" and then I don't know what to say so it is just weird. I don't really know what to share with people! Ambree and Daniel. Learn the Scripture Mastery verses. And study the scriptures in Preach my Gospel. I always felt like I knew the Gospel pretty well, and I think I still do in action, but scriptures are the best way to provide validity to my words and I feel like I don't know them near as well as I should. BUT. I just keep moving forward. The first few days were really hard, but it gets better everyday. I love you all! Glad to hear the family is well!

Love,
Hermana Clark
P.S. It can get really confusing when I call myself Sister and Hermana Clark. I always get confused about who I am.

July 16, 2013

This week at the MTC I had the opportunity to switch companions for a half hour and practice teaching the commandments. We taught about the law of chastity, tithing, the word of wisdom and keeping the Sabbath Day holy. It was pretty fun! We did it all in Spanish (of course). There were some interesting moments when we didn't know the vocabulary.... It was neat to get to share some of the experiences I have had with those different laws. I never realized how blessed I am to have so many experiences. I didn't realize that I have had some experiences that some other missionaries have never really had that make the laws real for me. The Lord also took care of me this week when I was having a hard day. One of the other hermanas in the district noticed I was having a hard time (one a P-Day, don't worry! I am not wasting the Lord's time having bad days!). She took about an hour and just talked to me and asked how I was doing. I felt really blessed because that was exactly what I needed to feel better. Now that I am trying to spend so much time learning Spanish, I am noticing an increasingly difficult obstacle trying to communicate in English. Imagine that! I will get to the field and be unable to speak in Spanish or English. In my scriptures I have been trying to really study and notice times where different topics are talked about. I never realized before how much emphasis is put on baptism in the Book of Mormon. There is also much about the Atonement (naturally) that I never really noticed. I love reading my scriptures. I met this nice elder who was born in Mexico and he talked Spanish at me. It really was at me, because I think I only understood about 1/3 of what he said. I am thinking I better start praying for the gift of tongues a little harder if I plan on helping people! Truly the Lord already blesses me a lot to know as much Spanish as I do after so short a time. I also had the opportunity this week to help one of the hermans feel better by talking to her. I love feeling like I am helping someone and look forward to the opportunity to help more people in Washington. I can't even imagine what it is going to be like there, but I am about to find out next Tuesday! Time is flying.
Love, Hermana Clark

July 9, 2013

Buenas tardes! The MTC is just peachy. I eat pineapple everyday. Anything of interest this week? Well.... we get our travel plans for Washington at the end of this week. I can hardly believe it! I have been here for four weeks! We taught some members again on Friday. One of the members didn't show up, so I we ended up teaching one of the teachers. I didn't quite get that he was being himself, not a fake investigator, till about half-way through the lesson. I said the prayer and thanked Heavenly Father that would could teach him, but forgot his name right before I said it, so I had to say "this member". Ha. I hope he forgets soon. We picked up two new investigators, got dropped by one, and are going to have two "baptisms" on Saturday. It can be pretty interesting, pretending like I am attending a baptism. I think I am most excited to get into the field so that I don't have to pretend that the people I am teaching are actually going to have real outcomes. It is a good opportunity to learn about teaching. Our district is being disolved, so our first counselor was released yesterday. Kind of sad because he reminded me of Dad and now "Dad" isn't here anymore.... Hm. Oh well. The district isn't being completely disolved until we leave, which is Monday after next. So pretty much the presidency is being picked apart week by week. Next week the second counselor will be released. I am loving studying the scriptures here. I really could read for 15 hours straight and want to keep reading. For how much I read, you would think I would have finished The Book of Mormon since being here, but instead it is becoming quite the rainbow as I highlight different topics. Yesterday I saw one of my friends from high school and he told me that my other friend just got back and is strong in the faith. I felt like Alma and the sons of Mosiah when they met each other again and we filled with joy because their were still brethern in the Lord. It gave me some hope for the future because I felt how it feels to know someone has accepted the Gospel and it has changed their life. I look forward to when I can help families come together and accept Christ as their Savior. I am really interested to know who my next companion is. I just am really curious. I hope the family is doing well and is safe and sound. Love, Hermana Clark

July 2, 2013

For a family home evening, you should see if you can watch "The Character of Christ" talk by Elder Bednar. He gave it at the MTC last year or something. It is really good.

Our song went really well and I think our "investigator" liked it. He committed to a baptismal date next Saturday. Dan sent me another song in Spanish about baptism, so I think we might sing that to him too! So on Saturday, the music coordinators for Sacrament (the other two hermanas in our room) realized that there was no musical number for Sacrament Meeting. So what did we do? Hermana Boyack rented a violin from the MTC, and we played a song in Sacrament meeting. It was so fun! She is a violin major at BYUI and pretty good. I surely enjoyed it. I hope that I did it justice. We didn't have that much time to prepare.

So the highlight of the week is that we got to teach members. We had twenty minutes to share a message with one member. (We did it twice). The neat thing was that we went in with nothing prepared. I had no idea what we were going to say and I was a little nervous. We got in there, started talking to the first woman, Sister Ramero. She is divorced and her daughter and her are the only members in her family. The rest of her family is in Venezuela. I had no idea what to share, and my companion didn't have anything, so I decided to share one of my favorite scriptures, Alma 7:12. It was all in Spanish, so my companion told her to read 11 and 12 on accident, and then Sister Ramero ended up reading 10-12. It was perfect. She started crying and we talked about how the Lord loves her and her daughter. I tried to tell her to think of one blessing from Heavenly Father and share it with her daughter and her daughter will feel God's love also. I don't think it worked very well, but she wrote something down, so the spirit must have got a message across. The next lady has her family in Mexico and they are all baptized. I knew less of what to say to her because she has a lot of faith in Christ and knows of His love and blessings for her. I just opened my scriptures and looked for something highlighted. I found a scripture in Mosiah 18? That was about being of one baptism, one faith, and preaching the Gospel. I thought "Okay, we will just talk about how her family can be more unified through Christ". I think she started crying too and told us that her brothers are inactive. She said that she was going to start praying for them. It was pretty neat. Our Spanish was horrendous with that lady, but she felt the Spirit. The neatest thing about these experiences (called TRC) is that I don't feel like we really taught because our Spanish was the least effective thing about the lesson. Really, the Spirit taught those members. I really enjoyed teaching them and it lifted my spirits a lot. I really look forward to when we will be in Washington helping real people.

Love,
Hermana Clark

June 25, 2013

It has sure been exciting here, if that is the right word. As my companion says, "The days feel like weeks and the weeks feel like weeks." The day seems really long because we get up at six and go to bed at 10:30 and study the whole time. I can hardly every remember what I did that morning. But the weeks are flying by. It is crazy to think it has already been two weeks here at the MTC. My Spanish is greatly improved. I got to meet my mission president on Saturday. He is really nice. Him and his wife are here getting their training for being mission presidents. There was a world-wide broadcast on missionary work on Sunday. Did you go to it? I tried to be in the choir but there were too many missionaries so they had to tell probably two hundred of us that we couldn't be in the choir. It was a little sad, but hey, I can sing on my own. The two sisters in our district were in the choir and were on t.v. That was cool! I can hardly believe how much I had learned here. I think back to what I could say two weeks ago.... oh yeah, absolutely nothing. Except "Hola" and "Como esta?" Now to think I actually know what we say that and what parts of speech they are.... it is crazy. I have been trying to pray very specifically lately for the gift of tongues and the interpretation of tongues. My mission president said that we should pray for specific things, so I did. I have been praying for help in remembering and retaining all the words, and I have been praying that I can understand the grammar. It is so much easier this week than it was last week. I am not the best spanish speaker ever born, but I am feeling pretty alright about it. Back to my mission president - he grew up in the Federal Way Area. It was crazy because when he got his call he emailed church headquarters to ask if that was the right place. His parents and extended family apparently still live up there. The people went and asked the Quorum of the Twelve and they said "Yup! That is an inspired call!" So here we all are! Going to a mission where our mission president has spent nearly all of his life! It turns out that one of the elders in our district, Elder Ballard, just happens to be from our mission! He is going to Spain. He grew up in Ording (or something like that). It is just south of Federal Way, right smack in the middle of my mission! He got on the interactive map on the church website and he showed us the area and his house. He is pretty excited. You would think he was called there! Right! We were talking about my mission president. Him and his wife have two missionaries out right now. One is in the MTC and we just met her when we met President Eaton. They are very nice, real people. I think they are kind of goofy :) They just joked around and were very kind. Sister Eaton brought banana bread for us. The area I will be serving in will only be about 45 minutes wide, I think. Unless more spanish branches open up. The entire mission is about 2 1/2 hours in either direction. I enjoyed meeting them. They are just normal people who are trying to serve the Lord. I think that they will do a good job.

Let's see. What else is new? My district tried to do an "English Fast" on Friday. That was interesting. We all did a service project that morning. Hermana Biggs and I shined the trashcans in a building. Interesting service project, huh! I think that maybe they have a few more missionaries than they know what to do with...... We looked up trashcan in the dictionary and promptly started using it in our language ("escoria"). Later that day we went back to our classroom and were talking to one of our spanish teachers, Hermana Wilson. She kept asking us what we were talking about when we were telling her about trashcans. Well.... apparently we don't know how to use a dictionary because she told us the real word for trashcan. The one we had been using meant "worthless people". Phew! That could have gone bad in a lesson. Besides that the Spanish is going pretty well. The "English Fast" helped me learn a lot because I was forced to only communicate in Spanish. I can speak a lot better than I thought I could. I am beginning to feel more comfortable teaching and explaining gospel principles to investigators. We finished teaching "Constantino". Guess who it was? Our afternoon spanish teacher, Hermano Bulloch! The day after we finished teaching him he started teaching us in class. The teachers all just choose someone that they actually taught in their mission to be to give us practice teaching. They all do a really good job of being someone else. Yesterday we went to knock on our new investigators door "Nicolas". Nicolas (Hermano Bulloch) opened the door and the lights were off and he had just gotten up from a nap. He was really tired because he goes to classes all the time. We started getting to know him and teaching him about Christ and what do you know but his dogs start barking like crazy! (Hermano Bulloch put dogs barking on his phone and had them go off). We just keep teaching along, wondering if we should say something. I told him about Sparty, as best as I could. Sometimes it can be hard to pretend like they are real people. But then I think "If I can teach with the Spirit to someone who already knows the Gospel and believes in it, I can definitely teach with the Spirit to a real person!" That is probably the hardest part. I have been teaching a lot for the last few years of my life, but it is a different ball game trying to teach the Gospel. People don't just listen and take what I say as truth. I really have to try hard to work with my companion and bring the Spirit to testify. It is really hard! It is getting easier as I learn more spanish because I don't have to think as hard.

Like Justin Meyers said, we really do get to play beach volleyball all the time. Hmmm... anything else? Not sure. Like I said "Days are like weeks and weeks are like weeks." I can't think of anything else, yet I know I have done a lot of things in the last 7 days. Well. I guess that is it!

Love you tons!
Hermana Clark

Week 1

Dear Family,
 
The MTC is just marvelous. There are four girls in my room (most have six). Every day or so we teach some "investigators". They are employees of the MTC to help us practice teaching in Spanish. We only speak Spanish. Their names are Constantino and Marcos. Yesterday I told our investigator I would pray for his sunburn. Tomorrow I am going to say "Marcos! I prayed for your sunburn, did you pray to know the Book of Mormon is true?" We think we are pretty funny over here. Our Spanish is really broken so yesterday we were teaching about the Plan of Salvation. My companion, Hermana Biggs from Mesa Arizona, tried to say that the goal is to return to live with our Heavenly Father again. Well.... we only know about ten words in Spanish. We didn't know the word for "goal" so I decided to act it out. I acted out kicking a soccer ball and making a goal. Then our investigators thought they got points for going to heaven. They started acting out cheering. It was really funny. I think we laugh too much in our lessons... Sometimes they just listen to our Spanish and laugh. They fake like they don't know English. " Eh, Constantino! Como se dice trajabador en Englais?" "No se." That is how the conversations go. Hermana Biggs and I just laugh on the inside (sometimes outside) because we know they know English. That sentence was "How do you say hard-working in English?" "I don't know." Hermana Biggs and I are having quite the time with Spanish. Pretty much everyone else took it in high school. I am the oldest person in out district. I am probably the oldest in our zone also. I am also the only one who has never taken a language. There are 5 elders in our district and 4 hermanas. All of the hermanas are in my room.  They are super nice. One is from Salt Lake, the other from Albecerque. I tried to tell her that joke from National Treasure and she just kinda looked at me weird. Must never have seen that movie. I thought it was a funny joke.

 

The MTC is pretty good. I got to go to the temple today. We did initiatories. It is not weird at all to have a companion. I kinda feel like I have had a companion forever because I was always with Megan. At school, at home, at stores, etc. It was good practice. My companion is really nice, but we are different. She is pretty outspoken and is just a go-getter. I am more the type that sits and listens and stuff like that. It was a little challenging at first because she was just ready to do everything but we have been learning to work together. It is going a lot better. Yesterday was pretty cool. We were trying to decide what to teach our investigators. It was during personal study time and I decided that I would read Preach My Gospel. During companionship study we talked and we both had read about baptism during personal study and felt like we should share that. It was pretty cool because we hadn't talked about it and baptism seemed pretty random. As far as investigators go, I wouldn't have thought that these two were ready to hear something like that. We went in to our lesson and it took a while to start talking about that, but we finally did and they ended up having a lot of questions about it. Constantino comes from a Catholic background, so he has been baptized, but Marcos is Baptist and has never been baptized. We talked about it as best as we could, but I will admit it is a little challenging trying to answer questions when I don't really understand what they are saying and I don't know the words to use in Spanish. Having answers is not hard. It is knowing the Spanish words that is hard. It is really good practice to talk to them.

 

So, I know someone made a joke about sister missionaries getting leadership positions, but really, they do! Today I had an interview with the two "Sister Training Leaders". They are leaving next week, so I wondered if maybe they would ask me to be a new one. I don't really feel like they will ask me because my Spanish is not so great. Who knows? My companion Hermana Biggs is the senior companion. I think that is pretty funny because I am a year older. But, it doesn't really matter. I think we switch in two weeks or something. I don't know. We don't even really do anything that needs a senior/junior companionship because our whole schedule is planned for us already. We study all day. If we are not studying Spanish, we usually feel really weird and think we are sinning or something... it is kinda funny.

 

We met the Branch President (I got to play the piano for Sacrament Meeting on Sunday!). His name is President Wilkins. He is really nice and knows Spanish. Gives good advice. The first counselor is Brother Monson, nephew of President Monson. Second counselor is Brother Driggs. It is exciting! Sunday was pretty good but felt strange because I didn't study the Gospel for 14 hours like I do on regular days. Right now there are over 4,000 missionaries here. Something funny about the MTC.... so they have a lot of missionaries (elders and sisters) who are the same age. On the first day, we went to an orientation. What did they say in it? No jogging dates! We got to class and they emphasized that we do not flirt with each other in our district. We are family. Do we flirt with our brothers? No! It was pretty funny. I am like ... I don't want to flirt with any of them! They are years younger than me! All the time I see sisters and elders talking together and me and my companion laugh because we are seeing this so called "flirting". Really. It is everywhere. The sisters also get modesty talks every week. I bet the MTC was really different 12 months ago.

 

On the first day, we went to a seminar about teaching the gospel and caring about people. It is really neat here in the MTC because when we talk about learning a language, we talk about how we should be focusing on learning for our investigators. It is not about learning Spanish. It is about bringing others to Christ and we happen to be doing it in Spanish. In the seminar we talked to a "investigator". I learned more about how we need to make sure that we are teaching people, not lessons. We need to listen.

 

There have been a few moments where I wasn't homesick, more like lonely. I just wanted someone by me who really loved me because there is no one here who does. I just thought about my family. I was sitting in a devotional and the lady speaking said "You aren't alone. Jesus loves you and is always with you" or something like that. All the sudden I remembered and just thought about how true that is. I am not alone. There is always someone who loves me.

 

I feel like I should be saying something really epic here at the end... so I will bear my testimony in Spanish. I really am quite a lot better than I was. It can be hard and discouraging, but it helps when I pray for the gift of tongues. Yo se que JesuChristo es nosotros Salvador. Traves Christ, todos cosas es posible. There you go. I can pray in Spanish also. Hopefully next week I can speak in Spanish. That would be awesome.

 

Love,

Hermana Clark

 

 

 

 Hermana Clark's district.

 Hermana Clark's investigators. She's pretty sure this family is "golden."

Just Keep Smilin'

Our last moments, for 18 months, spent with Sister Clark ended with a great expression of love from all family members both whom were with her physically and those who weren't.

 Before we dropped Alyce off at the M.T.C we made a quick stop to enjoy a cool snow cone, across the street from B.Y.U. Creamery.

 Yes, Daniel did pick Alyce up and I'm sure he would have spun her around, had she not been in a skirt.

Our family is known for our "leech" hugs, no matter how different our height (Alyce is on her tipy-toes). There's just no letting go of our dear Sister Clark.

Alyce, you're a great sister even when you don't think you are. Just be yourself and I know you're going to bless so many people.

 Haha Alyce entered the wonderful new world of missionary work with enhanced red lips, thanks to our delicious snow cones!

 The M.T.C (Mission Training Center) was lined with hundreds of missionaries, both welcoming and arriving. Alyce commented that this is just like going to college. She'll be associated with people her age, that she will both learn from and be taught by

Here's the welcome party waiting to sweep our sister into the new world of missionary work.

 Just keep smilin', cause you know this isn't good-bye forever.

This is not "good-bye," we're just beginning a new "hello."

This is the last we saw of our sweet Alyce as she disappeared into the crowds of enthusiastic new missionaries.

We love you Alyce!

So long, farewell, I'd like to say Goodbye!

Written June 11, 2013

Good evening everybody! Tonight is the first night I am a sister missionary for The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. Kind of a funny feeling… I don’t know that I feel like a missionary today, but I am sure I will tomorrow when I am whisked off to the MTC. I am pleased to be here today. I never thought I would be here, but I am. Seven months ago, I was confident I was never going on a mission. The announcement had been made that the missionary age was lowered, but I just knew it wasn’t going to affect me. Well, I was right! I turned 21 last week! I decided to go because I got a nagging feeling in me - a pestering thought that told me this was the next experience I should be having. I thought long and hard and realized I was putting my desires and wants in front of the Lord’s. I knew the Holy Ghost was telling me I should leave, but I didn’t want to. I eventually came to the conclusion that if I really want to be a disciple of Jesus Christ, I better start be willing to do the Lord’s will rather than my own. So here I am today, a missionary. I don’t quite know what to expect, but I know that I can help at least someone out there, so I guess that is what I expect - several opportunities to help others. I expect to be a little confused by the Spanish that I won’t understand for a while, and I suppose I expect to eat a lot of rice and beans….

Sister Clark's last day as Alyce.

What better way to prepare for a mission than spending the day at Boondocks!

Texting away her last few hours with her own cell phone.

Sleeping while bowling....? I guess you have to stock up on the Zzzz's while you can!

At the batting cages preparing to fight on the "battle field" of eternity.

No swimming on your mission? No problem. Boondocks has a ride for that.

Last family dinner at Texas Roadhouse to celebrate our new missionary.

"She can be like our daughter."

The beautiful Clark girls (minus Angela).

 

 "Don't do this, don't say good bye. You're going to make me cry." (Jenna)

So instead of goodbye, Sister Alyce Clark is saying "Hello" to beginning a new adventure to add to her little book of life.

"Alyce... You're going to blossom like a flower in spring."

Well said Jenna, well said.

We love you Sister Clark. Godspeed.