Sunday, November 20, 2016

Dear Family,

Can you believe another week has gone by!! We are down to 8 months and 25 days.  I worked on my “How To” handbook for the next office secretary this week. Since the law has changed I needed to update things. Hopefully who ever follows Dad and I out here will be able to follow our notes ok.

I found marshmallows’ at a store in a mall on Saturday. I bought several bags. I was hoping to make fudge for Christmas but I hadn’t seen marshmallows anywhere.  They don’t have Karo syrup here either so toffee is going to be iffy. I did find a recipe for it on-line so I’ll try a batch and see how it turns out.

We welcomed two new volunteers this week and said goodbye to 4. It’s exciting to have them come in but also so sad to have them leave.

Thursday Ramon took Dad and me to Metro. We hadn’t been in a while so we had to stock up. We ended up having to buy two new reusable bags for our stuff. Ramon helps bring the bags upstairs and he carried 6 bags at a time. This guy is in his 50’s but is still in super good shape.

Friday we had our district meeting and they all decided to make tacos afterwards. They invited the sister’s investigator, Jonathan, over for it. Dad and I were in the office working when all of a sudden the fire alarm went off. Apparently, Elder Buchanan took a pan off the burner and put it on a hot pad. Then he put the pan back on the burner but the hot pad was stuck to the bottom of the pan, and he didn’t notice. The resulting smoke set off the fire alarm. Dad shut off the alarm and then Sasha got a call from the fire department.  He assures them that everything is fine.

We had District Conference this week. It’s like Stake conference only for a smaller group of people. To get ready for my Sunday dinner I fried a ton of hamburger and onions on Friday night (I cook a lot so I can freeze some for later). Saturday after conference I made chili and cornbread. Sunday I made apple crisp. I had chips and grated cheese to go with it. I had a ton of food and it turned out pretty good.  Elder Lytle was there for the first time so we gave him the princess cup.

On Saturday we went to the conference, and I ran into Lyudmila from NovoK. She is the sweetest little Babushka. We gave each other a huge hug and said at the same time “I love you too,” in English. We do this almost every Sunday. I went with the women to the women’s meeting while the priesthood had their meeting.  I did go through 3 translators. I gave the microphone to Sister Hofmann and she handed it off to Sister Palmer and she handed it off to Sister Graham.

Sister O ended that meeting talking about how to keep the feeling you get while attending the temple with you every day. She said to 1. Feast on the word of God everyday. She used the example of Mary and Martha.

 2. Take time every day to serve someone. She talked about her handicapped brother who almost drowned, as a young boy, in a neighbor’s pool. The sisters in her ward worked together to help take care of her brother. She said because of their great care her brother lived another 15 years.

3. Make time to be grateful every day. She talked about the 10 leapers and how all were healed and only one came back to thank Jesus. He received a blessing for his gratitude.

Luke 17:19

19 And he said unto him, Arise, go thy way: thy faith hath made thee whole

It was a great talk. In the main meeting on Sunday one Sister who is waiting for her mission call (should be at the office on Monday), talked about how the Savior is closer than you think he is. The next speaker talked about how we (LDS) are not alone in Russia there are a lot of us. He talked about how life changed when he came into contact with the church. Then he told us that when we serve in the Temple we are saving our relatives.

The Stake Relief Society President, Sister Zolitoff, spoke and she has been a member for 20 years. She talked about the importance of Free Agency. How we are free to choose but not free from the consequences.

Another speaker talked about doing more than we are doing now and the cleansing power of repentance and the Sacrament. Another speaker talked about Faith. How God exists but some people don’t move toward him so they don’t find him.

Sister Ottesen talked about being unified and President O talked about not being offended and to go and find the Lords lost sheep.

It’s so amazing in the Church, this could have been a conference held anywhere in the world. We are all learning about the same things. I guess one thing was different; we listened to a translation of all the talks through a headset.

It’s been sunny out for over a week now but the temperature has dropped dramatically. I guess we can have it warmer but overcast or sunny and freezing.

I’m sending pictures of a Russian Orthodox Church. I thought it looked interesting because of the skyscrapers behind it.

We took a picture of a statue across from the Mega City mall. We went there on Saturday for lunch and Dad bought an external hard drive, ours quit working.

This is what the internet says about the man the statue is for;

Mikhail Vasilyevich Lomonosov (/ˌlɒməˈnɔːsɔːf, -sɒf/;[1] Russian: Михаи́л Васи́льевич Ломоно́сов; IPA: [mʲɪxɐˈil vɐˈsʲilʲjɪvʲɪtɕ ləmɐˈnosəf] ( listen); November 19 [O.S. November 8] 1711 – April 15 [O.S. April 4] 1765) was a Russian polymath, scientist and writer, who made important contributions to literature, education, and science. Among his discoveries was the atmosphere of Venus and the Law of Mass Conservation in chemical reactions. His spheres of science were natural science, chemistry, physics, mineralogy, history, art, philology, optical devices and others. Lomonosov was also a poet and influenced the formation of the modern Russian literary language.

President had a great letter this week. I’ll share a part of it with you:

For the past 10 years, I made monthly business trips to China. Over the years, I learned to eat handily with chopsticks and I met some incredible people. One lady I met told me a powerful story. In the 1960s, China went through a terrible cultural revolution where millions of Chinese farmers were starved by their government. Back then, she was a small girl. She grew up in a family of 7 children where food was scarce. The family only had enough money to afford 1 fish per day to share with the entire family—usually only a carp. That is not much food. The little family of 7 was slowly starving. She described mealtime where he watched his mother divide up the fish to be shared by all the children. Then just a young girl, she remembered when the family sat down to the meal, the mother insisted on taking the fish head as her portion. At the time, the young girl thought it was odd his mother wanted to have the fish head. But she said the children were so hungry they eagerly ate their small portion of fish and really didn't think much of their mother stuck with the fish head. Why do you think this mother chose the fish head over the better parts of the fish? I think you can guess. While her children barely survived starvation, sadly the mother did not. It was not until after she died that her children realized the sacrifice she had made for all of them. I am guessing you have a mother who would do that very same thing for you. What have you done for her lately to show her how much you appreciate her?

This is to Mom: MOM, I LOVE YOU. YOU’VE ALWAYS BEEN SUCH A GOOD EXAMPLE OF MOTHERHOOD, WIFEHOOD, FEELING CLOSE TO GOD, ALL WHILE HAVING A GREAT SENSE OF HUMOR AND HAVING FUN IN LIFE. YOU’VE HAVE HELPED TO SHAPE THE PERSON I AM TODAY AND I WILL BE FOREVER GRATEFUL THAT YOU AND DAD RAISED ME TO LOVE GOD AND TO LOVE MY FAMILY. THANK YOU FOR NEVER GIVING UP ON ME AND ALWAYS LOVING ME AND MY CHILDREN AND MY GRANDCHILDREN. LYNN AND I PRAY FOR YOU EVERY NIGHT.

What are you doing to try and eliminate selfishness from your heart?

The Lord rebuked some leaders in His restored Church for being selfish---for seeking the praise of the world and for having their minds on the things of the earth more than on the things of the Lord (D&C 30:2; 58:39). Those rebukes remind us that as his servants in Russia, we are to act differently. Elder John A. Widtsoe said of latter day missionaries like us, “We cannot walk as other men, or talk as other men, or do as other men, for we have a different destiny, obligation, and responsibility placed upon us, and we must fit ourselves [to it].”

C. S. Lewis explained this teaching of the Savior: “The moment you have a self at all, there is a possibility of putting yourself first—wanting to be the center—wanting to be God, in fact. That was the sin of Satan: and that was the sin he taught the human race. Some people think the fall of man had something to do with sex, but that is a mistake. … What Satan put into the heads of our ancestors was the idea that they could ‘be like gods’—could set up on their own as if they had created themselves—be their own masters—invent some sort of happiness for themselves outside God, apart from God. And out of that hopeless attempt has come … the long terrible story of man trying to find something other than God which will make him happy.”

A selfish person is more interested in pleasing himself—than in pleasing God.

A great example of unselfish service is the late Mother Teresa of Calcutta. She gave herself to “wholehearted free service to the poorest of the poor.” She taught that “one thing will always secure heaven for us—the acts of charity and kindness with which we have filled our lives. She said, “We can do no great things,” ---only small things with great love

Love you all

Mom