hello hello everyone!
emailing is hard because so many things can happen in a week.. but i'll try my best. so we got here on tuesday and literally the second I stepped off the plane and took a breath I could feel the difference in the air. its not quite as bad as I thought but so much different than good old utah. speaking of utah, every time I tell people that's where I'm from, they kind of roll their eyes.. like oh of course. hahah sorry not sorry okies. tuesday night we all met with pres walkenhorst for like 2 minutes each so it wasn't much but still enough to tell that hes a great guy.
oh and my bike!! holy! thats so nice guys, you better believe I'm bringing that home. we are in a car right now, thank heavens because it is ridiculously hot. but we also have limited miles so we have to be careful.
so we didn't meet our trainers and all that until wednesday and my trainer is sister call. she is from spokane washington and comes from a family of 9 kids!! crazy huh? she is a great missionary though. she's been out 6 months and one of the first things she said was that we were going to learn together, not just her 'training' me. shes a cutie. hahaha I love it. these members are so awesome though. before every meeting (besides sacrament) they ask for missionary experiences from the members and they don't start until they hear a few. how awesome is that? they are all so nice and have such strong testimonies. thursday we do our normal morning schedule which is:
6:30-7 work out, 7-8 eat and get ready, 8-9 personal study, 9-10 comp study. and then we do weekly planning for like 2 hours! I was not expecting that but I totally see why its necessary. president told us that the reason we do weekly planning on thursdays is because every thursday morning the first presidency and the quorum of the 12 go into the temple and pray specifically for the missionaries so we have some extra help that day you could say :) isn't that the coolest thing ever? I sure think so! oh also.. the first day with my trainer and stuff, we taught a lesson AND went and talked to the young women about being on a mission.. welcome to the field sister franklin! I felt so dumb kinda.. I'm like well, this is my first day but the mtc was great? haha they asked a few questions that I could answer though so it was still good. there is a family getting baptized on saturday, (the mom) asked me to speak on baptism..at her baptism. I'm like, you know you don't have to choose us? because she asked sister call to do the talk on the holy ghost. and shes like well duh but I want you to. shes like I know you're new and have only taught me like 2 lessons but I love you already. shes hilarious and SUCH an okie talker. which just means, we have the hardest time keeping her focused because she can talk..for like forever. but she's got such a strong testimony, I'm excited for their family. they already have the date set to receive their endowment and be sealed because they are so pumped to go through the temple. its like the year mark of their baptism, to the day. they already get how big of a deal the temple is!
so for the most part, the elders in our area took all of our investigators because they had to split the 1st area and they took all of the ones the sisters before had so that's a bummer. but that just means more finding for us! (president doesn't like the t word...tracting) its finding with faith. so we go to a neighborhood in our area and start knockin. theres plenty of people that just say no thanks I'm not interested but theres a few that let us at least explain who we are and what the heck we are doing sweating our guts out in the middle of the day.
I had my very first bashing experience and oh man it was something else. she was on our list of unknowns, which just means shes either a nonmember or a less active so we went to find out. she took a look at our nametags and said get off my property I want nothing to do with that cult. so we were about to do just that until her daughter came around the corner and they just had to explain everything wrong with the church. the reason I say bashing experience and not bible bashing is because she didn't pull out ANY scripture, just sat there bashing on 'us Mormons.' it bugged, I won't lie. me and sister call just stood there and listened for a few minutes and could not find a 3 second gap in her rant to say okay we're gonna go. she was so crazy. and so many times I thought of a comment to say to her but me and sister call were talking about how her heart is SO closed off, its not worth it to put another bad taste in her mouth about us. after we finally left we started talking about it and it made us so grateful to know what we know. I asked sister call if we could say a prayer because after that I just wasn't feeling the spirit.. for obvious reasons, so we did and both got emotional and felt so happy to know the church is true. as we were walking up to the next house I saw a white butterfly and started to cry all over again. chels and my father in heaven knew that I needed that right then and there.
I have seen a butterfly every day but one. it was the first thing I saw when we walked out of the church on the first day and I was amazed at how big of a comfort that was. mission life is hard, we are on the go 24/7 and every hour is planned out but there is something so fulfilling about walking around, FINDING, as we are hot and sweaty. something sister call says a lot at doors is that we would not be away from our homes for 18 months, and walking around in the heat if the book of Mormon and the gospel hadn't blessed our lives. and how true that is!
the night we came to meet the bishop, there just so happened to be a dad and his daughter meeting with him too. his name is R and her name is A. he just got divorced and they are both having a really hard time with it and literally came to the church looking for help. we got there and bishop was like can I borrow you sisters for a minute? and then he introduced us to them and explained their situation and said that alani preferred talking to girls and talked about how he was ready and willing to do anything and how he already felt good about it. long story short we have a lesson with them on tuesday and its going to be great. the lord definitely prepares people.
oklahoma is hot, flat, and humid and I am so happy to be here :) haha I love you all so much more than you know and I couldn't be doing this without your love and support because its definitely hard and can be frustrating and makes you question every little thing you do but in the end, when you lay down at night, you can tell if you have given your all that day. I hope you all know how much I love you because its grown times a million being out here. sister call hears about you probably a lot more than she cares to but im not sorry..haha keep on being the best ever. love you!
xo sister franklin
Sister Call & Sister Franklin
mission selfie
first purchase
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