July 7, 2014

I'm a Maine-iac!

[This is really close to where Bethany lives in Old Town, Maine.  (Thank you, Google Maps Satellite View!)
Her apartment is to the left a few blocks beyond the lower bridge.
It's going to be even more gorgeous in about 2-3 months when the fall foliage is at its peak!]

Dear Family,

I would have never guessed what this week would have brought me. Alright so I am in Bangor, ME. It is so nice to see people. I don't feel like I am in the middle of no where. So here is the situation with me being in Bangor. They took out a set of Elders in this ward and replaced it with us. We are living in the old Elder's apartment. I had never been in an Elder's apartment before, but it is exactly what I thought it would look like. Dirt and all.  You have no idea how good it felt to clean it today. But they did have an unlimited supply of hot sauce so that's tight! And we also have a legit bench pressing equipment in our apartment as well. I am planning on benching 200 lb by the end of the transfer. I love being shot gunned, so this has been a really fun week. We have been trying to meet as many of the members we can. I love them already and I am really looking forward to serving and helping them do missionary work. 

Our area also covers the U Maine college. From what I have seen of it, it seems like a pretty nice campus and school. Their is so much to do! It is awesome! 

I love you all! Congrats Lizzy!

Sista Lassen

[For those of you who don't know...  Lizzy opened her mission call last Saturday, and she is going to Boise, Idaho, reporting to the MTC on October 22.  I need a map!]

[Also other information--Bethany's new companion is Sister Houston, from Vernal, Utah.  She will be going on splits about once per week in her area/new assignment.  "Shotgunning" means to have both companions in an area new.  There is also a set of elders in the ward.  The ward has less than 100 attending sacrament meeting which is pretty big for New England.]

June 30, 2014

Vacation is Over

Dear Family,

After two short transfers I am getting transferred. I have been so blessed to serve in Laconia. This has been a really busy, spiritual, and exciting area. It showed me how important it is to have the members be ready for missionary work. The work moves forward when the members are ready. We are just here to help them. Hopefully I won't get transferred ever again. That would be nice. I hate transfers.

The work has been going great. Investigators progressing, new people popping out of no where, and teaching like crazy. It has been sweet. 

This week I also got to go on an exchange with SISTER ESCOBAR! If you don't remember, she was my second companion. And she was waiting for her visa. After all this time she finally gets to go to Brazil and I got to go on an exchange with her for her last week in the field. It was so cool to she where she and I have been to become the missionaries that we are today. The day we were together was a lot of "Remember when we were super awkward and we had no idea what we were doing?" And then we realized that we still don't know what we are doing half the time and just hope the Spirit can pop something out of our mouths. If I were the Spirit I would be like "Come on, you have been doing this for over a year, now get it together!" Good thing it doesn't work like that. There is no limit to the spiritual promptings that we receive. 

Well I love you all, and we will see where I will be going soon!

Sista Lassen 

June 23, 2014

Happiest Missionary

First, I (mom) will include a letter we received from a member of Bethany's Ward, along with this picture that she sent:

Your daughter was here for supper tonight and saw this picture that we have of our last Family Home Evening.

We meet every Monday night at 5:30 at the Chapel, which is in the background, and enjoy a pot luck supper before a lesson.  We are done and out the door by about 7.  We started with about 4 couples in homes in the area and grew to too many to have in homes and got permission to hold it at church.  The Elders and Sisters are always invited if they don't have a place to eat on Mondays so we get the pleasure of having them once in awhile.  We also get them to be the speakers at least once during their stay in Laconia.

Your Daughter is a great missionary and we have enjoyed having her in our home for a meal and a lesson.
I hope when she gets ready to leave that you will be able to come to New Hampshire for a visit.

I am the one kneeling in the front and my husband is the man on the left end.

Thanks for having such a wonderful daughter.

Don and Nancy Stephenson

Bethany is second from the right

Now, on to Bethany's letter:

Dear Family,

You are now reading the letter of the happiest sister missionary. I cannot describe the amazing week we have had. I have been experiencing really great studies and I have learned two things. First, Diligence. Not that I wasn't staying busy or working, but I have been trying to have the Christlike attribute of diligence and I feel an increase in the Spirit and Heavenly Father's Blessings. Second, Giving EVERYTHING to Christ, just handing it all over to Him. Every little thing. When I first got this prompting, the first thought that came to my mind is, "But it's HARD!" So I got on my knees and prayed. The most amazing thing has happened. It was easy and I thought that I already had the Spirit with me, but now it is spirit 2.0. Which is good because I desperately need all the help I can for the people that we are teaching.

We had a lesson with our investigator E. this week. WOW! Just WOW! We had already taught him the first three lessons, but he wasn't understanding the importance of praying about the Book of Mormon. For our lesson this past week we read 3 Nephi 11. That chapter has so much power. In the middle of the lesson Matt walked in to ask him a question. Before he left we asked him how he knows the Book of Mormon is true. He bore a powerful testimony and confirmed everything that we just told E. Answer to prayers? I think yes. After we read 3 Nephi 11 we asked him a few questions and he said... out of the blue, "I think I want to get Baptized." This man is experiencing true conversion and it is AMAZING to see the Spirit work within him. WOW, WOW, WOW. You don't even know how amazing this is! After that lesson I was shaking.  All I could do was jump and shake and go crazy. I have been so blessed to be the mouth-piece, and just wow. I am so grateful. E. also came to church on Sunday in a full suit like he is already a member.

Some other fun things that we have been doing is planting tomatoes, weeding, herding cows, staking hay, and my favorite, shoveling cow poo. I am totally not playing, that really is my favorite part! Sister Magnusson and I think that we should have a cow poo flinging competition at the fair. It would be sweet. I am loving farm life.

Family, you really have no idea the miracle and blessing of sharing the gospel. I would have never thought the amazing joy that it would bring me. I expected to increase my testimony, met cool people, learn the gospel, and have crazy stories. But I never expected the amazing joy that sharing the gospel and helping others would bring to my life.

Love you all!

Sista Lassen

June 16, 2014

Bike Week!

[So THIS is what "Bike Week" means in Laconia, NH!
(Just a heads up, don't google it, unless you want to see the seedy and skanky side of New Hampshire!)]

Dear Family,

 

This week is Bike week in good ole Laconia, NH. So that means, lots of cops everywhere and you will be driving and there will be a group of 20 motorcycles behind you. And that's even when you live in the next town there is a consistant white noise of motorcycels. It is sweet. I think I am going to buy a bike... or maybe just a T-shirt.

 

 Anywho back to the cooler missionary stuff.

 

So If you don't remeber Sister Magnusson and I shot gunned this area (meaning that we both came here at the same time) It's been the funnest thing and this week at interviews I told President Stoker that I would be happy to do it again. The coolest part is because you both don't know anyone so you have no pre judgements on anyone and you just go by the Spirit. The biggest miracle from this was a less active member, G. So, when we first got here we looked at the past sister weekly plans and it said G Wednesday- drop lesson. Which means that she wasn't progressing and they were going to take a break. The first time we met her, we felt that we should coninue to see her. And now look where she is!! Well you can't, but just believe me! She has come so far. It just shows me how much Heavenly Father loves us individually and watches over each and every one of us. And sometimes he makes drastic changes to do it.

 

One more story:

So, we were contacting another less active member, knocked on their door and no answer. We decided that we would knock on the surrounding houses and then go somewhere else. After we had done that I felt like we should do one more house, not realizing how far the next one was. When we finally got there no one was home. As we were walking back to our car another car stopped, who was it? The less active member we were trying to meet. How sweet is that? It's like this is Heavenly Father's work or something!

 

The work continues to move forward in this area, and I am so grateful that I get to serve here. Love you all!

 

Sista Lassen

June 9, 2014

Mormon Media Week

Dear family,

This week we really loved Mormon Media weekend. Mormon Media weekend is where we take out a bunch of members out with us then post about it on facebook to get the word out. If anything, it helps us to take members out with us, and get them pumped for missionary work. We also went with them to see some less active members. This made it easier to see who is progressing and who is not ready to come back. With taking members out with us and running around every where I really don't remember most of what happened.

While working with members this week we had a sweet experience. Two weeks ago we prayed to know who we should invite to find someone for us to teach. We felt prompted the G family was it, so we committed them. This week we followed up with them. Although they didn't have anyone ready for us to teach, every one of them had a missionary experience and felt more in tune with the Spirit while seeking for missionary opportunities. They were pumped, made me more pumped! It was sweet.

We have been working on teaching the restoration in 7 minutes, and have already had miracles from it. For media weekend one of our members wanted us to teach her friend. When we showed up at her friend's house she only had 15 min. Which was perfect! If we hadn't been practicing teaching in 7 minutes then we would have missed our opportunity to teach the restoration. Knowing how to teach in short lessons is so inspired! It's like the gospel is true, or something.

image from http://www.byujourneys.org/blog/about-hallowed-ground-sacred-journeys/

We also got to go to the JSM again this week. This time with G. It was wonderful and the same spirit was there. So, G. is awesome and she knows Heavenly Father is watching out for her. The day we went she was praying that it wouldn't rain while we needed to be outside. It rained the whole time we were traveling there and during the tour. But.... By the time we wanted to go outside and look at the monument, take pictures and eat dinner outside IT WAS SUNNY! Which was no surprise to G. Then it rained the whole way home. He really does watch over us.

That's all for this week! Love you all!!

Sista Lassen

June 2, 1014

Feeling Like a New Missionary

Dear family,

It has been a really rewarding week. The work is on fire! The ward is doing great, all they really need is to be invited to do something and they do it. We have having lots of referrals and new potentials to work with. And to add to that we are finding new investigators and potentials in our own finding efforts. We asked one of the members to share her missionary experience at Fast Sunday and she did. She also said she can't say no to the sister missionaries. And then another member said that as well. I was really embarrassing, but that's okay!

We had a really sweet lesson with our investigator E this week. He works at the Swain dairy farm. We taught him the restoration in under 30 min, simply, used HTBT[How to begin Teaching Bullet points Teaching, or something like that] and asked questions. The spirit was really strong. I felt like everything that I have learned came together in that lesson. The most amazing and important part was on spiritual experience that he had after. At the end of the lesson he prayed that he would have the strength he needed to finish the farm work and that D would soon come to help him. After our lesson, as planned, we helping him with the farm work, and D did come to help finish them. The work was done at least a half hour sooner than usual. Before we left we told him that his prayer was answered, to which he answered "I feel like someone has my back." Which is amazing because at the beginning of the lesson he told us that he felt like God has never been there for him. I have really been learning that the spiritual experiences that they have on their own are more important than when we teach them. Their experiences is where their faith is strengthened. No wonder we make commitments!S

I seriously feel like I am a new missionary again. Soaking in all of this knowledge! One thing that we have been learning is the importance of saying simple powerful statements of 100% truth so the Spirit can full be there. It has made such a difference.

Sister Lassen at the Joseph Smith Memorial, May 2014 (Birthplace of the Prophet Joseph Smith)

I also got to take another investigator to the Joseph Smith Memorial on Saturday. Before we went I was praying that I would be able to increase my testimony that Joseph Smith is a prophet. The first time that I came to that sacred grove and JSM, I loved the feeling of being in the trees and how green it is here, so much that I thought that every green forest felt the same. I have lived on the East coast long enough to realize that not every place feels like the sacred grove and the JSM.  Nothing can fake that. It's true! The church is true! How lovely it is to testify of that everyday.

The weather is absolutely beautiful. And I love it here! Love you all!

Sister Lassen

May 26, 2014

Snail Mail This Week

[A benefit of having snail mail is that Bethany sends pictures!  Yea!]

All the libraries are closed for the holiday, so it's on to the old fashioned hand writing for this week.

We had a successful week and were able to teach lots of people.We have been truly blessed for our work.  Most of the people we taught this week were all referrals from one of the members that we live with, Brother Swain.  He knows everyone in Sanbornton and he will proceed to map out the whole town; who lives where, and who we should go see.  It's amazing!  Whenever we meet someone in Sanbornton, one of the first questions we ask is, "Do you know the Swains?"

"The cow just farted"
"Swain Dairy Farm May 2014, Sanbornton, NH"

We also got to work at Brother Swain's Dad's dairy farm on Saturday.  We fed the baby cows, pigs, and helped milk the cows.  Oh!  And fed them hay, bread, and donuts.  Only some of them like donuts.  My favorite part of the farm happened when we are walking across the farm and came to a foot-deep puddle of poop water (I had rubber boots on.)  I decided I would walk around.  Before I knew it, I was past my knees in cow poop.  E. (our investigator) lifted me out of it.  We were all laughing so hard.  I was ready to get back to work in my poop covered pants but Eric got a hose for me to rinse it off.  He told us that we had enough and could go home.  But we, being tough, told him, "No way are we going to let a little... well, a lot of poop stop us from finishing the work."

On Sunday Sister Magnusson and I gave talks in Sacrament Meeting.  I talked about how increasing faith=increasing the miracles in missionary work.  It turned out pretty good and I'll send it to you next week.

The funniest thing happen after I gave my talk.  A visitor came up to me and asked me where I was from.  I told her Southern CA and she says, "Oh, in your talk we heard you say 'Nephi' and from the way you said it we thought you might be from Kentucky where we are from."  CAN YOU BELIEVE IT!  I AM TURNING SOUTHERN & FOOLING THE SOUTHERNERS!  I'm not even trying.  This is the second time in a month that someone has asked me that.  I'm going to start saying I am from the south.

I am still in awe every day at how beautiful it is here.  If only it stayed "May weather" all year around!  That would be heaven on earth.

I love and pray for you every day.  Keep smiling and being happy; it was planned for you.

<3 Sista Lassen

"I'm Sailing!"

P.S.  "What About Bob" wasn't even filmed on Lake Winnapesaukee.  Talk about crushing my dreams.