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

happy new year!

Maandag 4 januari 2015

Heeeeey allemaal!
Happy new yeaaaaar! :D I have to keep it short today :)

But I have to tell you a couple cool stories :D 

First of all, on new year's eve we went to some members' homes, so that was a lot of fun. Bishop Drysdale invited us to come over, since he knew how to make oliebollen! :D muahahahha :D So I actually did have some oliebollen :D That night we had dinner with one of our WML's. We made pannenkoeken for them :D It actually tasted pretty good, hahaha! Can you believe that?! :) Anyways, on Tuesday it was soooooo cold here! It was storming outside, so the wind was blowing like crazy! The trash cans had fallen over, so there was trash flying around everywhere and there was snow everywhere. Later on we found out that because of the wind it was like -20 F outside O.o so that is like -29 Celsius.... so like I said: it was pretty cold :3 Bbut you gotta do what you gotta do! :) Satan is not going to stop working because of a snowstorm, so we better get out there as well! :)

 

The next day it was still a little bit cold, like 16 F (-8 Celsius),  we walked everywhere and it was sooo good! Because if it wasn't for that we wouldn't have had the miracle that I'm about to tell you!!! :D We were walking down the street to stop by a member that we promised to stop by. As we were walking we saw an elderly man shoveling snow, so we stopped and offered to help him. He turned out to be a member and we asked him for referrals and stuff. But no results from that. After our conversation we continued walking and decided to knock on a potential investigator's door. We could see them inside, but they didn't answer the door. Then somebody walks by and asks us if we are the sister missionaries! So we're like: yeeees!!! We are the sisters!!! :D She asked us where her ward would be and we looked it up and told her. She was about to continue walking her dog, but the Spirit hit me and was like: 'ask her if she is a member'. To be honest, that question would have never come to my mind, because if people want to know where their ward is they usually would be members that recently moved in or something. Anyways, the Spirit knows best, so I asked her if she was a member. Then she responded: Actually, I'm not. But I'd like to be one! 

 

 

WHAAAAAAAT?!!!! :D

So we're freaking out of course! :D So I got so excited that I probably screamed at her, saying: We can help you with that!!! :D :D :D

And she was like: oh really?!!! And we're like: YEAH!!! :D So yeah, kind of a crazy week huh?! :D But it's been so great! Miracles are happening and the work is moving forward! :D 

My time is pretty much up, so I will leave you with my testimony that I know that God is a God of miracles, that sacrifice brings forth the blessings of heaven, that Christ lives, that He is our Savior and that all He wants for us is to be happy and return home :)

Lots and Lots of Love

Sister Spijkerman <3

We wish you (...) a happy new year!

Maandag 29 december 2014

Maandag 29 december 2014

Hiii allemaal!!!!

Het was zooo leuk om jullie allemaal weer te zien! :D Wel een beetje vreemd, hoor, maar ja, wat wil je wanneer je een jaar op zending bent! :) Ik voelde me zo schuldig over mijn Nederlands! :s Het spijt me echt heel erg! :(

Anyways...De rok is helemaal geweldig! :D Thank you sooo much!!! :D De cadeautjes waren ook helemaal het einde! Iedereen is zooo ontzettend lief voor me geweest gedurende deze tijd van het jaar! We zijn belachelijk veel verwend :) Nadat ik het skype gesprek met jullie had afgesloten opende we een cadeautje dat Nick Lange voor ons had gekocht :) Je zult nooit geloven wat we hebben gekregen, hahaha XD Hij had ons Lord of the Rings lego gekocht, hahahhahaha XD IT"S THE BEST!!! XD So Sister Quiles en ik zijn nu aan het uitvechten wie wat krijgt, hahaha. Ik wilde Arwen :3

Afgelopen tijd heb ik veel over geloof geleerd en zitten nadenken. Ik weet dat geloof zoveel wonderen teweeg kan brengen! Geloof en hoop gaan altijd samen. Ik heb gezien hoe krachtig geloof daadwerkelijk is :) Ik heb veel zitten nadenken over het Barbie liedje 'your song will hold the key' where it says 'Believe in all that can be'. All things are possible if we just believe they're possible! I love Ether 12 and Hebrews 11 where it talks about all the miracles that happened because people had faith first. I also love President Packer's words. He said: 'We do not obey because we are blind. We obey because we see.'

 

Faith and hope is what has helped me so much throughout my mission. Hope and faith that good will come as we keep being diligent and have charity. So I plead with you to have faith. Have faith that good comes to those that keep the commandments of God and love God. I love Romans 8:28: 

And we know that all things work together for good to them that love God, to them who are the called according to his purpose.

 

I love all of you so much! :) Thank you for your sweet spirits :)

I hope you had a great tweede kerstdag! :D

Please eat some oliebollen for me, hahaha :) A happy new year and I will write you in 2015! :)

Lots of Love,

Sister Spijkerman