Hmmmm....

Maandag 11 mei 2015

 

Wingapo!!! :D 

So....Ik denk niet dat ik veel meer te vertellen heb eigenlijk....wow...sad day...! Gosh...I literally don't have anything to tell you.

 

O.o I can share with you what I learned during my studies today though! :D I really like this scripture: 

 

Verily, verily, I say unto you, this is my gospel; and ye know the things that ye must do in my church; for the works which ye have seen me do that shall ye also do; for that which ye have seen me do even that shall ye do; 2 Nephi 27:21

This scripture teaches us that a Restoration was NEEDED, because a Church that was exactly like the one that Christ had established when He was on the Earth couldn't be found. And as this scripture says: We need to do things the way Christ did them. There is really no excuse for changing doctrines and ordinances :) I also read the first part of a talk by Elder Perry this morning about the Book of Mormon and I really like this (it's actually a quote from President Benson): “The Book of Mormon was written for us today. God is the author of the book. It is a record of a fallen people, compiled by inspired men for our blessing today. Those people never had the book—it was meant for us. 

But I really like this quote by Elder Perry himself: 'Among the lessons we learn from the Book of Mormon are the cause and effect of war and under what conditions it is justified. It tells of evils and dangers of secret combinations, which are built up to get power and gain over the people. It tells of the reality of Satan and gives an indication of some of the methods he uses. It advises us on the proper use of wealth. It tells us of the plain and precious truths of the gospel and the reality and divinity of Jesus Christ and His atoning sacrifice for all mankind. It informs us of the gathering of the house of Israel in the last days. It tells us of the purpose and principles of missionary work. It warns us against pride, indifference, procrastination, the dangers of false traditions, hypocrisy, and unchastity. Now it is up to us to study the Book of Mormon and learn of its principles and apply them in our lives'.

I know the Book of Mormon teaches us so many valuable lessons, and who would have thought it would even teach us about time management, and finances and ALL the principles of missionary work?! :D It's sooooo cool!!!! :D

 

Oh, and I likes what our zone leaders said during Zone Meeting this Friday: 'Missions are an MTC for life.' 

I Love Y'all sooo much and have a blessed day!!!

Lots and Lots of Love

Sister Spijkerman

hartjes aanval... een manier om mensen te laten weten dat we aan ze denken....

It is well with my souuuhooouuul!!!

Maandag 4 mei 2015

I'll keep it short this week, but this week has been AWESOME!!!!!!!!! :D

GOSH! So, we had these amazing lessons with our investigator about the Plan of Salvation. She told us she prayed about Joseph Smith and that she'd received an answer that he truly was a prophet!!! WHAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA :D Then she told us she knows now why she had to move here: so she could meet us so we could teach her the Gospel and truly help her understand the Gospel, rather than her just accepting whatever we tell her!

 

IT's sooo cool to see the Spirit work with her and testify to her heart that this message is true! :D She wants to get baptized, so now she's on date for MAY 23RD!!!!! :D :D :D BEST DAY EVER!!! :D AAAAAAAH!!! As you can tell, I'm soooo excited!

 

Then we also had a couple of other former investigators tell us that they want to meet with us again, that they have missed us and that they want to find happiness in their lives :D WOOOHOOOOO!!!! :D Isn't that SO great?! :D

 

OH OH OH! Then the new mission president over the Belgium/Netherlands mission lives super close to us and he was Sister Anderson's first high counselor over missionary work on her mission! So he found out through some friends where we lived and he contacted us and took us and Elder Scherf and his companion out for lunch this week! :D He is sooooooo nice! His name is President Bunell!! So I'm so excited to work with him when I come home! He'll be so great! :D So...yeah....that's pretty much it! Life is soooo great! I'm so happy!!! :D 

 

I love y'all lots and God be with you till we meet again! :D

Lots and Lots of Love

Sister Spijkerman <3

O,o,

Maandag 27 april 2015

Heeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeey!!!

So, this week was like absolutely crazy! Satan is attacking the people we're teaching like CRAZY!!!! And it drives me crazy! 'It's like...leave us alone! Ghehehe, funny story though....

 

We had an appointment with a less-active sister and she had a friend over. I'm pretty sure her friend was tipsy (to say the least), because she was going through some really hard times. You could just feel the tension in the room. We say an opening prayer and we're trying to read Mosiah 3 with them. The friend wanted to read it, because she wanted to talk so it would make her feel better. ok... She starts reading and then the two of them started talking about something and within a second they starting fighting and arguing with each other! O.o so we're like...what the ginger ale... O.O so sister Anderson tries to bring it back to reading Mosiah 3, and after reading like 8 verses, the LA is like: ok, I can't handle more for today. so she closed the book. (and in the meantime they had already argued again). So we're trying to leave with the Spirit, so we wanted to say a prayer, and her friend started praying like this: Dear Heavenly Father....(silence)....I'm not sure how to put this into words....(and she has like this whiny voice...) and then our LA started yelling at her and said: If you don't know what you're saying, stop praying!!! Sister Anderson, you pray! Then sister Anderson had to pray. It was soooo awkward, weird, uncomfortable, and at the same time it was pretty funny...

Then we also had a really cool moment this week! We dropped off a meet the mormons dvd for a nonmember and as we're walking back to our car this guy walks by and we started talking to him. So we kind of did our thing and at first he wasn't very interested in talking to us. But as we talked more, he started asking questions. Like who God is? The purpose of life? We started talking about the plan of salvation and at the end he said he had to go, but that he'd love to meet with us another time to talk more! It was AWESOME!!! We gave him a copy of the Book of Mormon :D 

We also had lunch with Sister Hoole last week and that was AMAZING! It was so great to meet her! :D

 

Oh, we had our fireside with Kenneth Cope yesterday! We were just thinking of ways to get non-members to come to something and to get members more excited about missionary work. So I asked Kenneth Cope  if he could come do a fireside in our stake! We had it yesterday and the whole chapel was filled! :D It was soooo great! Even some non-members came! :D Woohoo! 

He talked a lot about our potential and divinity as children of our Heavenly Father. It was so beautiful and I felt so uplifted! So I want to testify to you that I know that we have a Father and Brother who love us and who KNOW us perfectly! When life gets dark and dreary, don't forget to pray. The Lord wants to use us as an instrument in His hands right NOW, broken, torn, scattered. 

I am so grateful for the Atonement and for Christ's grace! 

Lots and Lots of Love

Sister Spijkerman <3






Here we go :D

Maandag 20 april 2015

Heeeeeey everyone!!! :D

 So, first things first! My new companion is Sister Anderson! :D She is from Miami Florida and we actually go home together... :) Crazy huh?!

 

So they're white washing the area in a couple of weeks, which is kinda sad, because we worked so hard in this area to get things going and finally little by little we see the fruits of our labors. But hey, we can't argue with the Lord's will :)

 

We've had an INCREDIBLE week! One of our investigators called us and said she wants to get baptized! So I taught her very briefly the first 3 lessons in 30 minutes over the phone. Then on Saturday we taught her the restoration and as for now she is still struggling with Joseph Smith. She is reading the Book of Mormon, praying and she came to Church yesterday! We know she will receive a testimony soon :D I just absolutely LOVE her! I just feel like I had to be here for her :)

 

Sister Anderson and I get along super great! It feels like we've been companions forever :) Well, actually, we've served around each other quite a bit, so maybe that's why :) We had a great week full of tracting, street contacting, teaching and it's just been great. We had some pretty hilarious and cool experiences while tracting. There where a lot of college students living in the apartments, so must of them where either drunk or high, so it was quite interesting.

 

My favorite story is the following! We knock on this door, this guy answers the door and is kinda staring at us and says: Hi... And we were like: HIIII!!! :D We are the sister missionaries and we are here to share a message with you about Christ that will bless your life so much! He kept staring at us and said: I would LOVE to talk about that! But...I am going to close the door now. And then he closed the door. And we still tried to testify and give him a Book of Mormon, but it was too late :( It was pretty funny though. we're like: what just happened O.o

 

But then we also had a pretty cool experience :D This girl answered the door and welcomed us in to warm up .She immediately said she wasn't Mormon and that she doesn't want to be one, but that we were welcome to come in and have some water. We went inside and we talked for like 45 minutes about what we do as missionaries and why we do it :) She said she was looking for truth in her life, but she wasn't ready to meet with us quite yet. We invited her to watch Meet the Mormons so we're going to buy her a copy today so she can watch it and feel the Spirit :) It was an amazing experience! We all felt super uplifted and she said we were just beaming because we were so convinced of what we believed in :)

I love y'all!!!

Lots and Lots of Love

Sister Spijkerman <3

Sister Kreiberg, sister Spijkerman and 2 adorable children with their mom

TRANSFERS! (AGAIN O.o)

Maandag, 13 April 2015

*tromgeroffel*

Well, I'm going to die in Hillside Stake! woohoo!!! :D Sister Kreiberg is leaving me though, so I will have one more companion :) I'm excited to find out who it is! :) 

Hm....this week was actually a really good week! We had some good lessons and interactions with people! :) I was on exchanges twice and I had a great uplifting time! The sisters here are just so great! :D

 

Thursday we had a lesson with one of our investigators and it was at a part member family's house! One of our ward missionaries came as well. We talked about the Plan of Salvation. Then during the lesson our investigator told us how when he met us. He had actually had a hard day that day, but he felt something when we met each other that it made him happy and it made his day feel better! :D We told him it was the Spirit and that he needed to keep looking for that! :) But also, that day when we met him, as we were talking to him I didn't feel quite like he was sincere or not, so I wasn't sure how everything was going to turn out. But then he told us this during the lesson!

 

It taught me a big lesson that we really never know what seed we're planting! Even when we think we haven't done anything or that the person isn't interested, they still could have been touched by the Spirit! :) So, never give up! Never doubt!

 

 'Look unto me in every thought; doubt not, fear not' is what the Savior invited us to do :)

 

This week I was reading in Alma, and I loooove this scripture in Alma 36:24-25

 

forgot to take pictures last week, sorry

Yeah, and from that time even until now, I have labored without ceasing, that i might bring souls unto repentance; that I might bring them to taste of the exceeding joy of which I did taste; that they might also be born of God, and be filled with the Holy Ghost.

Yea, and now behold, O, my son, the Lord doth give me exceedingly great joy in the fruit of my labors;

 

Isn't that like the best Scripture EVER?! :D

 

I love yáll so much! :D Have a great and blessed week!

Lots and lots of Love,
Sister Spijkerman

General Conference: A Missionary Holiday

Maandag 6 April 2015

HAPPY EASTER!!!! :D

So, this week was pretty awesome obviously, seeing General conference! :D

I went on exchanges again as usual, this time with Sister Gilmore from upstate New York :)  I absolutely love her and we definitely had a great time together :) Due to exchanges I haven't met our new investigators that we found this week yet...Anyways, 

GENERAL CONFERENCE! 

We attended General Conference downtown at the Conference Center for the Saturday morning session and that was AWESOME! Guess who I ran into?! :D ELDER MUNTINGA! He is serving in the Ogden mission so I didn't expect him to be there, but he was sitting in the same section as we were, so that was super awesome! :D Man, all the sessions  were just sooo amazing! I LOVED Elder Pearson's talk! (Staying by the tree). It's probably because I know him, since he was in my last area :3 He is AMAZING! He is a wonderful spirit about him when you talk to him. He would always go through the congregation after Church to talk to all the members, and hug them. Put a hand on their shoulders... He is one of the most Christ-like people I've ever met :) Anyways...IT WAS AMAZING!

 Oh, and I got a headset and I listened to the session in Dutch, so I could hear pappa speak! :D It was soooo coooool!!! :D And it really helped me understand President Packer's talk too, hahaha  *sigh* I just don't have the words today to describe this weekend!

We watched the Saturday afternoon session at the Drysdale's and they made poffertjes :3 I loved the talk about music :D And I loved the one about that it doesn't matter what calling we hold! It was really amazing, because just the night before the zone leaders and I had talked about how some of the sisters feel like they're bad missionaries because they have never trained before or because they have never been a Sister Training Leader. Other sisters just really want to have the title...

I tried to explain to them that it's not about the title, but that we can serve and influence others for good without the title of a trainer or sister training leader.We were just really concerned about this and then BOOM: A general authority gives a talk on that subject! :D

 

Sunday morning we went to one of our WMLs for Easter breakfast and a little Easter hunt, and they had made us little Easter baskets with Deseret book stuff :3 Soooo sweeet!!! Then we watched General Conference at their house :D It was awesome! In the afternoon we went to another WMLs house :) After our wonderful dinner with the Brushes we went to a recent convert's house and we watched Finding Faith in Christ with her :) 

It was definitely one of the BEST Easters EVER!
 

I have loved reading about Easter in the scriptures and it filled my soul with so much gratitude for my Savior and for all the pain He went through for me personally. I wish it could have been me who suffered, but I never would have been able to pay the price for my own sins. I loved the talk on Grace too by the way. Grace is an amazing concept :) I'm grateful for His grace and for the strength He gives me every day :)

I love y'all and wish y'all the best!!! Keep praying for me :)

Lots and Lots of Love

Sister Spijkerman <3

Higher Ground

Maandag 30 maart 2015

Goodmorning/evening my beloved family!

Wow, it's been quite a week!

 

We went to the Jordan River temple on Tuesday morning and it was AMAZING! I miss the temple so so much...In the Celestial Room a brother explained to me some of the symbolism in the temple. He said it took him a long time to discover some of it, but he told me he comes to the temple EVERY day! :D Lucky him! I learned a lot from him :)

 

Wednesday I went on exchanges with Sister Case, and that was absolutely awesome! We walked a lot, laughed a lot, talked to a lot of people, and had some crazy funny experiences!

 

For example we started talking to this guy on the street. So we shook his hand and he kind of kept walking, and I kept asking him questions, asked if he'd met with missionaries before, etc. He said he had, and when I asked him what his experience was he said he couldn't remember (O.o) and that he was in a hurry to get to his appointment. So we kept walking and started tracting a certain street and then we saw the same guy coming out of his house ten minutes later....hahahahahha XD Yup, he was definitely in a hurry to get to an appointment! Busted, haahahha! It was pretty funny.... :)

 

Gosh, missionary work is just the best. Yesterday I realized that for the most part the joy of missionary work comes from sharing the Gospel. Not the results that come from it! That night we didn't have a dinner appointment, so we had three different kinds of cereal for dinner :) It was awesome!

 

Thursday we had Zone Conference!!! :D I had to give a training with Sister Crotts on the Miscellaneous use for Mobile Devices, which is like the biggest joke EVER, because I don't even know how to use an Ipad myself... But it went surprisingly well, since we had an open discussion with all the missionaries on what we could do on our mobile devices to do effective missionary work.

 

Sister Eberhardt gave an amazing training about staying active after our missions. I loved one of the things she said: 'Do not get life in your way!!!' Always put visiting teaching etc first before homework and other stuff. It was amazing! On Friday we had a mission devotional and Elder Allen of the missionary department and the Utah area president came to speak to us and he spoke a lot about repentance and the Atonement. He gave us 8 questions to ponder:

1. What gifts/treasures have I given to the Savior?

2. Do all of my sins have a cloak?
3. What are my temptations?
4. What have you forsaken?
5. In what ways do I forsake Him and flee?
6. What are my spiritual gifts and how am I seeking after them?
7. If the Savior were to come to you and would ask you 'Lovest thou me more than these?', what would your 'these' be?
8. What kind of a disciple am I?

This week I'm going to ponder and work on these questions and I would invite all of you to do the same :) It was a great spiritual moment! What I loved the most about that evening was being united and gathered as a mission and being one in heart, mind, spirit and purpose. Before the devotional we took a mission picture outside and we sang our mission song "Brightly Beams Our Father's Mercy". It still gives me chills thinking about it :) 

Saturday we got locked out of our car, because the keys feel out of Sister Kreiberg's bag, so they were still in the car when we locked it...hahahahha. missionary life... Went to the Conference Center with a recent convert. The Women's Conference was absoutely wonderful! My favorite talk was from sister Oscarson! :) 

Wow, that was a long email... :D And I got tons of pictures too! :D

I love y'all so much!!!

Lots and Lots of Love
Sister Spijkerman

The Akwardness is real...

Maandag 23 maart 2015

Heeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeey!!!! :D

 Well, this week was...interesting...and totally crazy...

 

On Tuesday we taught a cute little member family the restoration (they're both returned missionaries from the Scotland/Ireland mission) and their son, Damian (2 years old), called us sisternaries! Soooo cute!!!

 

Then that night we 'taught' our new friend! She is supersweet and she has a 2 year old boy! We sat outside on her lawn and the boy DID NOT want to share her with us, hahaha. So he took her to the other side of the lawn. So we're like screaming to her, trying to do "How to begin teaching", figuring out her religious background, her beliefs and stuff like that. Trying to testify to her of God's plan for her, her family and the little boy just kept leading her away by the hand. So when we went to the other side to sit closer by... He decided to go down the street, and so there they went, up and down, from the left to the right. Us trying to teach her about the Gospel. It was hilarious, and definitely one of the most awkward, but funny teaching experiences on my mission XD Next time we'll be teaching her about the plan of salvation, since she wants to learn the role of Christ in our religion. Her mom passed away when she was in her 20s. So I'm sure she'll loooove the plan of salvation! We're excited! :D

 

Wednesday we got sick, we stayed in. I wasn't that sick. We had some appointments, so I went out with members for a couple of hours. But it was sooo weird not having a missionary companion with me...I have to admit: I simply did not know what to do with myself! O.o It was weird. For dinner we went to the Palmers and they're friends with the Bryner's. They had invited the Bryner's over for dinner!!!! :D :D :D IT WAS SOOOOO AWESOMEEE!!!! :D

 

Friday I went on exchanges with Sister Tatafu and it was a lot of fun! :D So recently we've had a lot of funny experiences with people. Since we're walking every other day we try to talk to people on the street, but seriously, every single person that walks on the street will literally cross the street, turn the other way, or suddenly walk into their backyard or walk to their door (I'm CONVINCED that people just walk up to a random house so they can avoid us. It's TOO much of a coincidence that EVERY time we see people they are at their house and that they have to go inside their house. hahahahha! It just cracks me up!) Missionary work in Utah is the best :3 Well, that's about it :D Weird stuff going on, but life is great!

 

Seriously, the lyrics of the song 'You Raise Me Up' are true! On Friday morning during my personal study time I felt prompted to read my patriarchal blessing and to make a list of two things. On one side I wrote down the things Heavenly Father told me to do in order to for me to be happy and blessings to be fulfilled. Then one the other side I wrote down all the blessings and promises that lie in store for me based on my faiithfulness. I discovered that my list was only like  bullet points, while my blessings didn't seem to come to an end! So our Father in Heaven is so loving and merciful! :)

I love you all!!!
Have a great and blessed week!!!

Lots and lots of love
Sister Spijkerman 

 

The Lord loveth His children

Maandag 16 Maart 2015

Halleu Halleu!

Wow, I can't believe another week has flown by! I have to admit, this was probably one of the hardest weeks on my mission. Investigators dropping us, investigators and other people canceling, not showing up, nobody that we're trying to contact being home...Missionary life... I feel like my whole mission I've been able to be happy and cheerful no matter what, but somehow this week I just couldn't find the strength to do it. I have always taken this quote to heart: 

 

“Pray as though everything depended upon God. Work as though everything depended upon you. 

 

It has always worked out so far, but for some reason even that didn't seem to work. But then the answer to my prayer came yesterday. We ended up having dinner with a family that I absolutely love, because the family that had signed up was sick. This family is a very special and precious family. The husband is convert, got baptized about 15 years ago and the wife is the sweetest person on the planet. They have two ADORABLE children, a girl and a boy.They asked us about us and our families and our conversion stories and they told theirs. The Spirit was strong and it uplifted me so so much. It testified to me again that no matter what's going on on our mission, even when we don't see any seemingly results, this is where we're meant to be. There is no better choice or place. At the end when we had to leave the boy and the girl didn't want us to leave and told us we had to stay and that they were going to be missionaries with us. The little boy (he's like 2 years old) even cried his little heart out! It was soooo cute and so sad!!! I just wish I could take this family home with me!!! I'm sure they would fit in my suitcase! So that was definitely a tender mercy and an answer to my heartfelt prayers :')

Well, so far it's been maybe a little bit of a depressing email, I'm sorry about that...But I know this week is going to be a lot better! We have quite a bit of appointments, so I'm excited! The weeks coming up are going to be sooo awesome! In 2 weeks we have zone conference, a mission devotional and we're going to the Jordan River temple, I'm super pumped! Then the week after that we have General Conference. We're going to the Saturday morning session at the Conference Center with a friend of the Church. We're excited about that! Then we're also taking a recent convert to the Women's Conference at the Conference Center, so yup, good and exciting things are ahead of us!

The weather here has been absolutely fabulous by the way! It's been in the 70's (so in the 20's celsius), so that's ridiculously warm for February and March! But I'm not complaining :) 

zuster Iris Spek en zuster Debby Spijkerman

 

Well, I think that's it for this week. I don't want you to worry about me, because I'm doing great! We all have our ups and downs, because that's part of life! There needs to be opposition in all things :)

I love you all and I want you to know that you're always in my prayers :)

Lots and Lots of Love

Sister Spijkerman

European Powerrr

Maandag 9 maart 2015

Heeeeeey allemaal!!!

Well....guess who my new companion is?! :D It's Sister Kreiberg and she is from....DENMARK!!!!

WHAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA!!! European power...keeps you safe from sin, hahahha :) (the real song is 'Scripture power keeps you safe from sin). Ayways, so yeah, that's pretty awesome :D Finally somebody who understands me ^ ^ 

Last week was sooo crazy, because besides transfers we had MLC and we got our Ipads O.O 

I was freaking out, because I had nooo idea what to do! I didn't know what to touch, what not to touch, how to get into things, how to download, how to use the AppStore and all the fun stuff, so I was lost, hahaha XD But it's all good. Thank goodness Sister Kreiberg has only been out for 3 transfers, so she knows what to do :) My little Ipad angel! :3 It's soooo awesome though! Because the new pamphlets that they have are soooo amazing and all the ensigns that we can read and it's just so amazing :3 I'm really grateful that the Lord has entrusted us with these Ipads :) 

Yesterday at dinner I shared one of my favorite scriptures, which is Alma 26:37: 

37 Now my brethren, we see that God is mindful of every people, whatsoever land they may be in; yea, he numbereth his people, and his bowels of mercy are over all the earth. Now this is my joy, and my great thanksgiving; yea, and I will give thanks unto my God forever. Amen.

On my Ipad I saw there was a footnote next to mindful, so I clicked on the reference (Yup, I finally figured that out:D) and it led me to Jacob 5:41:

41 And it came to pass that the Lord of the vineyard wept, and said unto the servant: What could I have done more for my vineyard?

I absolutely love that! What makes Him mindful of us is the fact that He is always looking for more ways to bless us, more ways to lead and guide us, more ways to bring us closer to Him. He does all that He can to make us happy. He's given us the FULLNESS of the Gospel through Joseph Smith, He prepared the Plan of Salvation for us, He sent down His Son, Jesus Christ, so we could overcome death and sin, He has given us His teachings, the five steps of happiness (aka the Gospel of Jesus Christ), He's blessed us with commandments, families, prophets, the Priesthood, etcetera, etcetera, etcetera. And then still we often choose not to follow Him. Then He weeps over us, because what else could He have done to help us and bless us? 

Since we're studying patience this month, I read the talk 'Patience - A Heavenly Virtue' by President Monson, and I loved a couple of things he said. He shared a poem that I absolutely loved: 

Life is real! Life is earnest!

And the greave is not its goal;
Dust thou are, to dust returnest,
Was not spoken of the soul.

Beautiful, huh? :) Then I also loved it when he said: 'Let the scriptures be your guide, and you will never find yourself traveling the road to nowhere.' IT'S TRUE! :D enough said :)

I love y'all very much and thank you for still loving me, even though I've been such a slacker with emailing and sending you my love... I'm sorry.... :s

Lots and Lots of Love

Sister Spijkerman

Transfers! (how did it go by so fast?! O.o)

Maandag 2 maart 2015

Heeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeey allemaal!!! 

Well, het nieuws waarop jullie allemaal hebben zitten wachten!!! TRANSFERS! :D

Sister Quiles and Sister Bates are both leaving me behind!!! So I'm taking over the area and I'll find out tomorrow who my new companion is going to be! Aaah, I'm wondering who is going to kill me!

And then I found out that the Avenues is getting whitewashed, weeeeeeeh!!! :( Sad day... :(

Last week we had a great week! Well, actually...there were A LOT of ups and downs!!! A lot a lot...

Up to the point that I just wanted to cry, because I didn't know what to do anymore. But then we had some amazing things happen too! Tuesday we had a training on our mobile devices (or in President Eberhardt's own words: everybody knows they're Ipads; why don't we just call them Ipads, hahaha).

 

Honestly, I wasn't excited, AT ALL! I was afraid of all the temptation that would come into the mission and when we were at family services we would see missionaries from other Salt Lake missions and they would be on their Mobile Devices all the time, and I don't want to be like that. So, kortom, I wasn't excited. So at the beginning of the training I prayed and prayed that I would receive I testimony through the Spirit to know for myself if this would be the right thing for our mission at this time. Throughout the whole training we didn't even touch or see an Ipad. All we talked about was the spiritual aspect of the new technology. How this is going to prepare us to learn how to use technology wisely after our missions so we can continue the Lord's work forever.

 

They talked about how the Lord shows us His trust in us through this. This is all about change and learning how to be in tune with the Spirit even more and to learn self-control and self-mastery. It was sooo spiritual and it has changed me forever!

 

Then yesterday we fasted as a mission for our mission goal of a 1080 baptisms by the end of July, and as we were fasting at Church one of our former investigators that had fallen off the face of the earth (not literally... :P) showed up at Church totally out of the blue!!! :D WHAAAAAA!!! :D He is struggling right now, so he got a blessing from the Elders Quorum president and one of our ward missionaries and in his blessing it said that he should start meeting with us again and start reading and praying daily again! WHOAAAAT?! :D Crazy, huh?! Then 3 of our less-actives came to church! :D so, I can testify to you that fasting brings miracles! I love how Heavenly Father knows our hearts and the desire of our hearts :) 

I will miss my two little sisters, but I know the Lord's will is what's best :) but still...I just love them so much...they have truly become my friends and my sisters...

I love all of you so much and hope that you may continue to witness miracles as well! 

I love y'all and may the Spirit be with you!

Lots of Love

Sister Spijkerman <3

Patience and Long-suffering

Maandag 23 februari 2015

Heeeeey allemaal! 

Ik heb niet zo heel erg veel te vertellen! Onze dinner appointment with Elder DeMass was super awesome! It was so great to see them again after so many years! I think for me personally it really helped me see clearly how much I have changed on my mission. I'm happy :D I love the Gospel sooo much and I love my Savior! I have overcome so many of my fears and now I just LOOOVE talking to people and getting to know them! Who would have thought! The Lord knew :) 

Actually, we had a great experience this week that truly strengthened my testimony of faith and the power of the Priesthood. Last week Sister Quiles got food poisoning. We were up all night with her, because she had to throw up every ten minutes. She was sooo sick! The next day we were going to have a lesson with one of our friends of the Church. She really wanted to be there for him. So we prayed for her and asked our district leader for a blessing early in the morning. We knew it would help her and we had the faith she would be healed, even though she would throw up everything she would drink or try to eat, even water. When she sat down to receive the blessing we even put a trash can in front of her, just in case she would have to throw up again. Then she got the blessing. In the blessing she was promised that she would stop throwing up and that whenever she would feel like she would have to throw up the feeling would go away. She would have the strength to go out and work. After the Amen was said. She looked up and she said that everything was gone. We bought her some medicine and ginger ale and we were able to teach our investigator! You should have seen the difference between before and after the blessing! So, the power of God is sooo real!!! :D

 

I love all of you sooo much! Love, Serve, Teach!

Lots of Love

Sister Spijkerman <3

 

Miracles and Metamorphosis

Maandag 16 februari 2015

HELLOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!

Wow, this week truly has been amazing!!! This week has changed me sooo much! We had so many experiences that helped me realize that God knows His children so perfectly, that we are truly instruments in His hands.

Our first experience was on Tuesday. Before Sister Bates was here Sister Quiles and I got lost and ended up in a street we'd never been before. We felt we had to be there so we started knocking on doors,. But nobody was home. Then we kind of forgot about it, but every time we wrote it in our planner to go back. But we never seemed to be able to have time. On Tuesday we had time, so we decided to go back to that street and we weren't sure where to go, We prayed and asked Heavenly Father to show us where to go. We felt we had to knock on a specific door. We decided to knock on all the doorsl. We got some good responses, but it wasn't it.

Then we came to the house we felt inspired to stop by. We knocked and a man answered the door. He told us he was a recovering member, that his daughter served a mission in the Netherlands. I was super excited of course and then I found out who it was. Sister Robbins, now known as Caitlin DeMass!!!! I'd been trying to find them in this mission forever, but without success. And then we were here, standing on this man's front porch, telling us that it was his daughter! There was no way we would have been able to talk to him and there was no way we could have set up a return appointment if we hadn't had that connection! :) We are going to have dinner with him and his daughter and husband this week! 

 

Again, we had that amazing connection! I am so grateful for the Spirit and that God KNOWS every single one of us. He reaches out to His children in love. I know that as we listen to the Spirit we will have miracles happen. We will find those that need our help :)

In the car on our way to dinner I was just sitting there in awe, that our Father in Heaven just knows who needs our help specifically and I felt an overwhelming sense of joy and happiness :) And soooo....we are going to have dinner on Friday! :D

Then also this transfer I decided I wanna get rid of all my fears. The Lord has helped me so much with that! When I finally figured out how to do street contacting (I know right, after 14 months I finally figured it out, because we never received any kind of training on it, so pretty much nobody really knows how to do it). But through a video of Dutch missionaries I finally figured it out! :D And it's sooo easy!!! :D And so now we talk to everybody we see and it is sooo great! :D We have had supergreat experiences, but also some really "funny' ones. At least, I can laugh about them :) There was this lady. We got up to her to shake her hand. We're like: HIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIII!!!! :D How are you?!!!! :D And you could see her face going like this: -_- Like: Oh no...it's the missionaries... -_- it was hilarious! XD She shook her hand, said: I'm Lutheran.

At first we were a little beteuterd, but then we laughed about it and continued our journey! :)

 

 

 

That same night we felt like we had to go visit this wonderful returning member, she's usually not home. Any unplanned visits usually don't work out. But we decided to listen to our feeling. We started walking, as we were walking down the street we ran into a man on a bike and we started talking to him. He told us he was getting kicked out of his house. He had nowhere to go, that his food bag got stolen. He told us he was depressed and didn't know what to do basically. We started talking about Jesus Christ, gave him a gift card for a restaurant. Gave him a plan of salvation pamphlet and testified of God's love for him. We gave him the bishop's number and our number, but he never called back :( He thanked us a billion times for talking to him and helping him. It was such an incredible experience!

And you know what, that returning member wasn't home when we finally got there, so the Spirit led us to this lost man :) So as you can tell, this week was so great! I've grown sooo much and I'm sooo happy! :)

I love y'all and hope that all of you are turning to the Light. I invite all of you to study with me charity for the rest of this month :) (this is what the whole mission of Debby is doing this month). It's truly changing me and I know it will change you forever as well. Let us love one another!

 

 

Lots and Lots of Love

Sister Spijkerman





Elder Scherf en zuster Spijkerman op leiders trainingsvergadering!!! THe Dutchies

Training! :)

Maandag 9 februari 2015

Lieve allemaal!

This week has been a hard one, but it's also been a great one! On Tuesday we had Mission Leadership Council. All the leaders in the mission came together (we have MLC once a month). My companion and I had to give a training on being lovingly bold. At first we weren't sure where to go with it. But we prayed a lot and the inspiration just kept flowing. We felt the Spirit so strong! :) It was a great experience for both of us. :) The Lord truly qualifies those whom He hath chosen :) The Lord will give you the words in the very hour you need them :) On Friday I had to give a training, but I can't do anything without my compadres of course. We gave a training during zone meeting on  developing the faith to find :) Finding investigators is definitely the hardest part of a mission I would say. Sometimes missionaries get discouraged. It's so amazing to spread the Gospel, no matter the results!


This morning I read an article about Elder Nelson coming to the MTC and Sister Nelson Said the following:

 “One key for success on your mission. I’d like to talk to you about desperation.” She explained, “When we are desperate everything changes. Our vision changes. We are suddenly able to see things we’ve never seen before. Our ability to do increases. We are suddenly able to do whatever it takes. ...
“My dear elders and sisters, I pray that on your mission you will have many moments of complete and overwhelming and even anguishing desperation. Why? Because then, and only then, will you desperately ask, desperately seek and desperately knock. Then, and only then, will you find the courage and determination to follow through with exactness everything the Lord needs you to do in order to serve a valiant vibrant, worthy and very successful mission for Him.” (This article is supergreat by the way! https://www.lds.org/church/news/missionaries-called-to-bring-joy-to-others-elder-nelson-says?cid=HPWE012815650&lang=eng )

This principle is so true! I've grown out of my comfort zone so much because of desperation, because I wanted to share the Gospel so badly. Now I'm not afraid anymore to talk to everyone on the streets, on their doorsteps, and to invite them to learn more! It's been so great! :D 

I love all of you so much!!! I'm so excited for all of you to be involved in missionary work!!! It's the BEST!  

The Church is true!!!! Gosh, how much I LOVE the Book of Mormon! I finished it again on Saturday and right now I'm counting all the references to Jesus Christ! I'm in Alma 11 right now, and cumulative I found 2079 so far O.o So...just saying, the Book of Mormon truly is another testament of Jesus Christ :) So I will let you know how much it is in the Book of Mormon as a whole. It just takes some time to count all of it... :)  May the Force be with you!!! :D

Lots and Lots of Love

Sister Spijkerman

Once there was a snowman...

Maandag 2 februari 2015

Hiiiiii Everyone!

So, you might be wondering why I chose for this title. It is because we haven't had snow in weeks. Right now it's like Spring! :) But we don't mind at all! At least, I don't.... :)

Last week was a pretty crazy week. Plans fell through, people needed help last minute, etc. So there was quite a bit of stress, which I'm not used to at all!

O.o  I've never been so stressed out so much in my entire life, hahaha! So it was a good lesson! :) We were able to be led to a new investigator this week! :D

We were walking it was after 6, so it was pretty dark. We saw a house that the Sisters before us had knocked on before. We have tried it before, but that time nobody answered. The first time the sisters met the lady she said  wasn't interested, because she was already a member, haha.

Anyways, I looked at the house and felt like we should try again. So we knocked on the door and a little boy answers. He talks to his dad for a bit, and invites us to come in! So, that was a miracle in itself! :D We sat down, the mom was on the phone, so they told us we could wait till she was done. We talked to the boy for a bit to get to know him. Then she came in and we talked for a bit about where we were from and so on. Which leads into asking if we could teach the boy!

We asked him if he knew what missionaries did and he knew a little bit about it. Then the mom took over and asked him if he wanted to learn more about the Church? She told us that he'd been going to Church in the Stake across the street with some friends and she told us he hadn't been baptized! :D He said he wanted to learn more! :D WHAAAAAAAA!!!!! MIRACLES pouring down from Heaven! :D

You should also know that this is the only ward that hasn't had investigators in FOREVER and we'd been trying and trying to find people in that ward without any success! :D So we are soooo happy! :D The Bishop of that ward, served his mission in The Netherlands, so I absolutely love his family! They are sooo awesome! :)

We also went to Temple Square on Saturday to watch Meet The Mormons! I just love that move so much! :) I hope they'll put in on DVD so I can bring it home and watch it with you! It's super inspiring! It's basically a movie/documentary about 6 different LDS families :) It's AMAZING! :D

 Well....I think that's about it for this week! Missions are the best and I hope you'll encourage EVERYBODY back home to go!!! :D it's so amazing! :) Lives change! The Gospel is true! The Atonement is real! And Christ is right there for us!

 I love y'all and pray that the Lord may continue to bless you! 

 Lots and Lots of Love

Sister Spijkerman

Maandag 26 januari 2015

Haaaaaaaaaaaaaaaai geliefde familie!!! :D 

Afgelopen week was...interessant...

Maandag was ik bij de doopdienst van een van mijn onderzoeksters in the Avenues! Kunnen jullie je nog die onderzoekster herinneren die dromen had dat ze lid van de kerk moest worden? Maandenlang had ze de doopdatum voor 19 januari, ze is gedoopt!!! :D Wooohoooooo!!! :D And it was fun to see the Bryner's again too :3 

Dinsdag hadden we transfers and Sister Bates is bij onze club gekomen! :D It's been soooo much fun so far! She is absolutely adorable! :D It's been fun living with 5 sisters in one home :)

 

This week our apartment was falling apart. A couple of our plugs don't work, then our heater stopped working, so it was 54 F (about 12 C)  in our apartment, that was pretty cold, hahaha. Then our power kept going out, and then our light bulbs all died! :) It's definitely been one of those missionary adventures :) Unfortunately we had to drop some investigators this week :(

 

But I know we'll be blessed with new people to teach! :) 

 

So I'd like to share with you something I learned this week during personal study! I was reading the end of 3 Nephi this week and in 3 Nephi 19 it says the following:

"And it came to pass that Jesus departed out of the midst of them, and went a little way off from

them and bowed himself to the earth ..."

What I learned:  is that even Jesus Christ Himself, the Only Begotten Son of the Father, went to a quiet place where He could pray and talk to His Father :) I thought that was pretty cool....

I don't think I really have something else to share with you this week, sorry....:) But I have tons of pictures though! Be grateful that Sister Quiles is still my companion, because she loves taking pictures and reminds me to take some too! :) 

 I love all of you and I am so grateful that through the Atonement of Christ all mankind will be saved! 

Lots and Lots of Love

Sister Spijkerman

A Miracle Shower

Maandag, 12 januari 2015

Hello Hello My Beloved Family!!! :D

It's pouring rain outside and it's been like this for the last couple of days. Which is very unusual for Utah... o.o It reminds me a lot of home. Which makes me very grateful to serve my mission in Utah, because honestly, I would have been miserable biking in the rain all day, hahaha! Heavenly Father definitely knew what He was doing! :D

This week has been a craaaazy week!!! :D We helped one of our investigators clean and organize her house, which is quite a project since she doesn't like to throw away stuff... But it makes us feel so good to help this poor old lady! :D Then, oh my gosh...

MIRACLE!!!! A couple of weeks ago we had dinner with a partmember family. She is a returned missionary from Italy and he is not a member. Sister Quiles told me beforehand that the sisters had approached him to ask if he was interested in meeting with them. But he told them he wasn't. He comes to church with his wife very often though. Anyways. So we went to dinner, and at first they were a little bit nervous and standoff-ish, probably because they were afraid that we would be slamming the Book of Mormon on the table. To have him read the Book of Mormon or something, hahaha.  Instead we had a great time just talking and at the end we shared a message.

 

At first when the wife asked him to join us for the message he didn't look very happy, but he probably didn't want to be rude, so he joined. We shared Alma 7:11-12 and testified of Jesus Christ and the Atonement. While we were talking he was super focused and he was paying attention. Of course letting his phone got off a couple of times. But he was smarter than that, so every time he turned it off! We could definitely feel the Spirit! That night they sent us home with some food. So we had the containers in our apartment for a while.

 

Sister Quiles had made cheesecake the day before. On Saturday we felt prompted to stop by to give them their containers back and give them the cheesecake. So we did. We knocked on their door. At first they didn't answer. After the second knock they asked who we were and we answered that we were the sister missionaries. Then she opened the door and looked kind of shocked. We're like oh..oh. She invited us to come in and they canceled their appointment for that night and invited them to eat cheesecake with them. So we did and as we were sitting down he started talking. He told us he'd just had an experience and he wanted to share that with us. This is pretty much what he said: 'As you know my wife is a Mormon, and I'm not. And that makes her really sad. I never realized how sad that makes her. And I was just telling her how surprisingly comfortable I feel at church. And 5 seconds after I said that you sisters knocked on our door.' 

 

....
...
..
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OH MY GOODNESS!!!!!!! :D 

So then we had a long conversations about the missionary lessons. He finally agreed to have us come back to teach him!!!! :D WHAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA!!!!!

So miracles are happening!!!! :D We're soooooo happy!!!! :D 

I love my mission so much and I'm so grateful for the gift of the Holy Ghost to help us in our work. seriously, we would not be able to do anything without it! :)

I love you all so much and I'm so grateful for your prayers and love for me!

Lots and Lots of Love

Sister Spijkerman