In Which Christmas Was Actually Spring *

Well, if I had to name the highlights of this week, it'd be first: It was incredibly warm all week long and ended up being 72 degrees on Christmas!! It was a very sunny, warm and slight humid day.  Wonderful beach weather, really.  And second. Lily is getting baptized this week!  Ahhh!  (Oh yes, and third, Christmas...that was a highlight too.)

But back to the important stuff!  We had the first discussion with Lily on Sunday, which is when we set the baptismal date for the 30th.  Then we just powered through all of the rest of lessons this week.  The only main concern, is her habit of drinking coffee all the time...but she has committed to herself, that she will stop drinking it by Monday (today).  Things have been crazy and it looks like a lot of the ward is going to be gone this week but things are still miraculously pulling together.  It has been such a blessing to watch the light in her countenance grow brighter and brighter.  She had experienced opposition from her family and her friends but she just bounces right back and pioneers on.  She is an incredible woman and she will bless and influence the lives of many, many people by her courageous example.

I had a wonderful Christmas.  It's probably just the nature of missionary work but I have been so gospel and Christ-focused during this Christmas season, that I haven't even noticed any of the commercialism that usually defines this time of the year.  We had kind of a slow morning in opening presents and just taking our time getting ready for church.  Then we looked at the clock and had a slight panic because it was already 9:30am and we had a lesson to teach Lily at 10am!  We had a 1-hour combined sacrament meeting.  Both the Old Hickory and Sunset wards met together.  And then, I was able to have a very Southern Christmas lunch, Skype my family (yay!) thanks to some wonderful members who offered their fast wifi (the Truman's), and enjoy a wonderful Christmas dinner with some of my favorite people (the Bell's and the Nash's).  And then we returned to our apartment and passed out on the beds from emotional and mental exhaustion.  It was great!

Sister Miller and I were talking to each other, earlier today, about how the gospel can be found even in the order of holidays throughout each year.  First comes Thanksgiving, in which we find gratitude for what we have.  Then, comes Christmas, in which we turn towards the Savior and want to gift presents and service to other people.  Then comes New Years Eve/Day, where we resolve to do better (repentance).  And then comes January and February...in which there are basically no holidays (excluding Valentines Day).  It is a trial of our faith and endurance!  Will we really keep our resolutions we set?  Then, Easter approaches and we are once again reminded of Christ but this time, we focus on His sacrifice and celebrate the fact that we, like Him, will live again and may inherit everlasting life, which is the eternal reward for our endurance to the end.  See?  The gospel is found metaphorically in everything!!

This is the only Christmas I'll have as a missionary but I'll remember it forever.  I'm so grateful for the Atonement and the change it brings.  I'm thankful for the wards I'm blessed to serve, for the members and people I'll be life-long friends with, for my awesome companion (who graciously pulls out Christmas messages on the impromptu when we have none and I, in her own words, "throw her under the bus").  I'm thankful to be a missionary, to grow a greater understanding and appreciation for the foundations of this gospel I'm sharing, and to learn from so many people I interact with!  See y'all next week!

Love,

Sister Ririe

. Gift from Sister Bell.  It was so cute!

Sister Miller and I wore matching Christmas outfits...completely unplanned.

Service with the Bell's.  They are Harry Potter fans and had a Nimbus 2000:). I just had to get a picture with it.

Add caption

I'm Dreaming of an Ice Christmas

Brrrr.  It's getting cold outside.  And there's no snow here.  Just ICE.  And while we're on the topic of crazy weather, we received a tornado watch warning and so we made arrangements with our bishop to call us if anything dangerous was going to happen.  But no worries!  No tornado danger here.  Just a lot of really loud wind.

Karyn went on a cruise with her family for a whole week (it's just so casual) but right before she left, she had us come over twice and help her pick her outfits whilst reading to her from the children's Book of Mormon.  We invited her to be baptized and talked with her about setting baptism as a goal. 

Also, we were finally able to teach Lily a lesson!  We taught her in Sister Chua's home with Brother Perry because both of hem speak her native language. She has a lot of reservations but is wanting to exercise her faith and just see where "being a Mormon" will take her.  Lily has been consistently coming to church for 5 weeks!  We were able to help her work through some of her family concerns.  She will be a brave pioneer to her family members, and we helped her realize that God has called her to be an example to her loved ones.  Doctrinally, she's pretty sound. She expressed that the Great Apostasy is her missing link (Catholics don't believe the Priesthood chain was ever broken)  and now everything is "as clear as water".  It was a very exciting lesson!! :D and...we set a baptismal date!!  She wants to be baptized on her birthday, December 30th!!!  Yay!!!  It's a little late, but talk about a white Christmas!!!  To be honest, I don't know if that's actually going to happen.  Her actual baptism will probably happen in January.  But for now, the 30th is a goal that she's set for herself and it'll be a good one to work on achieving.

It's so fascinating to see how the Lord times everything. When we first got here, we had 2 investigators, Jonathan and Kyle, who we taught several times a week, but suddenly were unable to contact as soon as we met Karyn and Lily. We ended up spending almost every day at Karyn'a home and were unable to teach Lily, even though she was coming to church regularly, because her schedule and work just wouldn't allow her to have time to sit down and listen to the discussions. And now that Karyn is on her cruise for a week, Lily's schedule suddenly opened up and we've arranged to teach her four more times this upcoming week, in preparation for her baptism!  

In the midst of all this, we were emergency employed by Elder Montgomery to bring in another group of brand new RAV-4s, all the way from Madison.  On the way back, we all got separated and the free-way traffic was super crazy!  But thanks to wonderful GPS's, we all got back to the mission office safely.  Driving new cars doesn't get old:)

Merry Christmas everyone!

Sister Ririe

We woke up and the truck was iced over!!!

2. At the ward Christmas breakfast, with our investigator, Lily!

We visited the Opryland Hotel today!

. 

Add caption

The Love of God

This week, we helped Karyn make another trifle:). This time, it was chocolate.  And we all nearly died from the wonderful sugar 😄

We had a mission tour with Elder Jörg Klebingat of the Seventy.  He had a special meeting with us missionaries and we were able to learn so much from him.  He is so bold and straight to the point.  He called us to repentance many times and challenged us to prepare for the gathering of Israel and Second Coming of Christ.  He's also very funny.  During the meeting, his father wanted to FaceTime and he accepted the call right in the middle and had a fun conversation in German with his dad while all of us watched:). The meeting was almost all day and I was able to sit in the very front row, in the middle.  When he talked with us, he was on the ground a lot so he was standing only a couple feet from me, most of the day!

One of the analogies he told us about was when a little girl gets out a piece of paper and some crayons and all out in drawing a masterpiece picture, she'll then waddle over and show it to her parents or grandparents.  And then, universally, what does every loving parent or grandparent do?  They lie.  They take that picture that really has no worth in the artist world and elevate it.  They'll tell her it's wonderful and laminate it and save it in a file or put it up on the fridge and rejoice in it.  And why do they do that?  Because they know that at that moment, that very place and hour, she has presented to them the very best she could do.  What would the loving parents not do?  They would not compare that little girl's work with an older sibling's drawing and tell her to try a little harder.  There would be absolutely no comparison at all.  So if mortal, fallen parents and grandparents do this, why do many of us believe that we have that kind of relationship with our perfect and loving Heavenly Father?  We are all acceptable to God.  There is absolutely nothing we have to do or can do to earn an "acceptable" title from our Heavenly Father.  He loves us as we are, and He will bestow all of heaven's blessings on us the very moment we decide to turn towards Him and return to Him.

I love this gospel and I know the Atonement works.  I know we are children of a Heavenly Father who cherishes us and we have a loving Savior who is cheering us on in our every effort to make it back.

Sister Ririe

Christmas party with Allison!

Storms and Miracles

Hi everyone!  

It's so weird that Christmas is right around the corner...

Monday night, the coolest thing happened.  So Andrew, the kid from Houston who is moving to Brentwood soon, answered his phone last night!  Just as a bit of background, we haven't been able to make contact with him again since he first called us a couple of weeks ago.  He didn't answer our calls, he didn't reply to our texts and there was no voicemail that had been set up...so I was beginning to worry that maybe we had the wrong number or that his initial phone call was a once in a blue moon miracle that wouldn't fully pan out into an actual investigator, or that maybe he had changed his mind.  Also, it was gloomy and drizzling rain all day and we were notified that it would begin storming and pouring rain sometime in the evening.  P-day had just ended so we got in the car and both of our appointments we were going to try, fell through.  Calling Andrew was the last planned activity we had for the day.  I dialed his number, half hoping he'd answer, all expecting he wouldn't again, and then to the surprise of both of us, he answers, "Hullo?"  

Ahhh!  We ask him how he's doing and if he's had a good Thanksgiving and what day specifically he's moving in.  In the middle of the conversation, I became aware that the storm was getting stronger and the rain was getting heavier.  It was getting hard to understand what he was saying.  We follow up on his commitment to read from the Book of Mormon and he said, yes he's been reading it, although he's been kind of skipping around and reading different parts.  We invited him to read Alma 32 and talked about growing faith.  Then, he surprised me by suddenly saying, "You know, it's so cool when I'm reading the Book of Mormon.  I'm...I kind of feel like, it's true."  Sister Miller asked if he's been praying to know if it's true and he said he has been.  We reiterated that the Holy Ghost would testify to him that it's the word of God.

Then the storm and noise gets crazy and he says something but neither of us clearly heard what he said so Sister Miller, kind of yelling into the phone, asks him to repeat himself.  "So, what would happen next?  What would I do if I know that it's true?"

I'm thinking, throughout all this, that this is the most bizarre scene I never expected to find myself in, and also, "are we really gonna do this?  Invite him to be baptized?"  Yup.  We do.  Our phone is Bluetooth connected to the car and we turned up the volume of speakers just about as loud as they were physically able to go...and we were both still straining to hear him replying.  But just barely over the sound of the pounding rain echoing against the body of the car and the abnormally loud, howling wind, I was able to hear him say, "Yes...yes, I'd be baptized.  Wow."  

Wow, is so right.  We haven't even met this kid face to face yet.  He's currently living in another state.  This is our second conversation with him, and it has only lasted less than 8 minutes long.  And yet, he's now become a progressing investigator who has sincerely and accepted an invitation to be baptized.  And get this...when the phone call ends, the rain has lightened up to its usual patter and the worst of the storm has passed by.

I'm so happy for the opportunity the Sunset youth will have to meet and get involved with this miracle investigator.  We've been keeping in contact with him over the phone since, and will be seeing him sometime this week.  

I'm so excited about Lily's progress and Karyn's as well.  They both came to the Relief Society Christmas party and had a great time.  Lily came to church again (that makes three times in a row!) and Karyn is desperately yearning for the peace and happiness that the Holy Ghost and the gospel brings to her life.  The work here in both Sunset and Old Hickory is really picking up and the ball has only begun rolling with momentum again.  When we first came here, we were told numerous times, by both wards, that partly because of the affluence in the area, missionary work was very slow in progress.  Not true.  We already have these three investigators who are so close to being ready for baptism and more who are ready to come closer to Christ as well.

I've fallen in love with this area and the members and the people here.  I'm thankful for the opportunity to share this wonderful gospel with everyone and to help others find lasting joy in their lives through Jesus Christ.

--

Love,

Sister Ririe

 Exchanges with Sister Woodruff

  Our district regularly goes out to lunch together.  This time, we all carpooled in that huge mission office van and had a party!

Ourlast district meeting of the transfer Elder McDonald is transferring home.  The missionary lingo phrase for that is that he's "dying" so we had a funeral for him.

Halfway?!

 Mormon culture? Green Jello.  Mormon doctrine? Book of Mormon.  That's the difference summed up in an accurate nutshell, according to one interesting fellow we knocked into last week.  I had a great Thanksgiving and I hope y'all did as well.  I had 5 Thanksgiving meals.  It's a wonder I didn't die from all the food 😂.  

The first meal was actually on Wednesday, with an investigator and her friends.  Lily, the mom who surprisingly arrived at church last week, invited us last minute to a Thanksgiving dinner and wanted to introduce us to some of her friends.  We already had a dinner with a member set up but after talking with President, we decided to reschedule our current appointment and go with Lily.  We didn't formally teach anything, like we were hoping to, but we planted many, many good seeds.  Lily is such a unique character.  She is from the Philippines.  She was raised in a convent with nuns and is so open about talking religion.  I kid you not, Lily talks more than she breathes and 75% of everything she said was relating to religion, particularly us LDS folk 😉.  It was interesting to hear her comment on all of the differences she notices with Mormons versus other Christians, particularly Catholics.  I think she knows the difference between what's doctrine and what's stereotypical Mormon culture though haha.  Sometimes, it's kind of difficult to help investigators see the difference between the two.  The gospel is perfect and everlasting.  The culture is the social behavior and traditions that a united people develop on their own.  Example: funeral potatoes!  

Lily is such a wonderful lady.  The other day, she emailed us, asking about a book she got in the mail that was talking about something along the end of the world.  She asked if it was a Mormon book.  We didn't know anything about the book so we told her it might contain inaccurate information on our church and suggested she read the Book of Mormon instead.  Her reply was priceless: "I have that book and I'm trying to read it for a second time. So I'm throwing away the one I got in the mailbox. I don't want to be so confused. lol."  After the incident with Jonathan reading anti literature, this was such a surprisingly refreshing response to hear!  She is so ready to accept the gospel.  She just doesn't quite realize how prepared she is yet.

Back to Thanksgiving meals...after that first Wednesday night dinner, we had a surprising Thanksgiving breakfast of French toast with Karyn and her husband, Bill.  We dropped by to make help her make a trifle and it turned out beautifully!  We planned to go back at the end of the day but she had some impromptu Black Friday shopping to do so that visit was post-poned to Friday.  When we went back the next day, Karyn had just gotten back from a dentist surgery and was sick from the aesthetics so she enjoyed a quick bite of the trifle with us then took a nap while we took the rest of the trifle to some members who live down the street: the Patin's.  Now, before y'all think we just dropped in on some random members to eat cake with, some brief background to all this is that the Patin's are Karyn's fellow-shippers and they were originally invited to come enjoy the trifle with us the night before, before Karyn canceled because of the Black Friday shopping emergency.  We dropped by at perfect timing because they were just about to eat lunch (you guessed it: left-over Thanksgiving food) and invited us to eat with them.

Yeah.  So. Much. Thanksgiving food.  Those weren't even the main meals we ate.  Thursday also contained a huge lunch with the Bell's and the second was a dinner with the Long's...both are member families in the Old Hickory Ward.  So many leftovers!

In between all of this craziness, miracles were happening right and left.  When we were at Karyn's on Thursday morning, she asked us what kind of music we listened to and Sister Miller immediately defaulted to MOTAB as an answer.  Confession: before my mission, I really couldn't stand MOTAB.  I thought they were boring and that only older people enjoyed listening to them.  Then I started listening to them more and my opinion changed.  I grew to eventually like them.  But I would never recommend them as my first choice of music to listen to.  Right after hearing we listen to the Mormon Tabernacle Choir, she looked them up on YouTube and listened to them.  "How Great Thou Art" began playing and a very strong stillness fell over the three of us as we listened to the song.  Karyn closes her eyes and begins singing along to the song.  She began crying and Sister Miller asked what she was feeling.  Karyn said, she couldn't quite describe it but that it was an overwhelming feeling of peace she hadn't quite felt before.  The Spirit was so strong and He made such a lasting impression on her.  

This week I hit my 9-month mark, meaning it's been nine months since I've been out in the field being a missionary.  It landed on a Wednesday, which means we had district meeting.  I baked a devil's food cake that looks like a volcano and Sister Miller got a number 9 candle.  Then the whole district sang the birthday song to me.  I requested that they all sing off key...and that turned out to be the best decision ever hahaha 😁!  I can't believe I've been out for 9 months already!  I'm already halfway through!

I am so grateful to be able to know and teach both Karyn and Lily and for the wonderful Spirit who accompanies this work.  I'm thankful to be a servant of the Lord and to be in the front row seats of the miraculous change the Atonement brings to people's lives.  I know that my Redeemer lives and my love for our Father in Heaven has expanded so much in the past 9 months.  I love this gospel and I love the people here.  I'm thankful for my family and friends and the support from everyone I've received in serving a mission.  

I love y'all and I'll see you next week!

Sister Ririe

Talk It, Walk it, Chalk it!

Hello again, everyone!

It's starting to get cold here!  Yesterday, for the first time since April, I wore one of my coats all day.  Thankfully all of the trees and plants are still very colorful.  There are so many vibrant shades of green, yellow, orange and red everywhere!  I'm still soaking it all in before most the leaves fall. 💨

The week began fantastically.  We met with both Jonathan and Kyle, on Monday and Tuesday nights and had amazing lessons with them.  For a little bit of a background, Jonathan is an investigator who has been interested in the church and meeting with missionaries for about a year.  He has struggled with Word of Wisdom problems, his whole life and has had some difficulty keeping his commitments.  But he truly wants to repent and change.  

During our second meeting with Jonathan, he had a friend over, named Kyle.  Kyle is literally one of the coolest humans on this planet, ever!  Let me just give you an example of his coolness:  we were talking about priesthood blessings one night and Jonathan had a lot of reservations towards receiving one.  He said he thought they were weird and unnatural, like an exorcising a demon or something.  Then Kyle, who's not a member, who knows absolutely nothing about priesthood blessings and has only spoken to us for a total of 2 minutes, pipes up in defense of priesthood blessings and tells Jonathan he should have more of an open mind!  There have been several instances like that.  Kyle has helped Jonathan understand the more about the Book of Mormon and exercising faith.  He keeps his commitments, and pushes Jonathan to do so as well!!  When we are struggling to try and help Jonathan overcome his reservations, questions and doubts about things like Joseph Smith and the validity of the Book of Mormon, Kyle will say something like, "Well, Jonathan, think of it like this..." and then he'll bring up a simple but profound analogy that somehow makes complete sense to Jonathan, and Jonathan will accept that answer, because it came from his best friend.  

On Tuesday, the Spirit was so strongly present in the lesson we had with them.  Both Jonathan and Kyle, especially Kyle, opened up about how they are not happy where they are at with their current relationship with God.  Sister Miller asked Kyle, "What can we do to strengthen our relationship with God?" and Kyle proceeded to create his own commitment, to pray everyday.  He then looked at Jonathan and prodded at him, "What about you, Buddy?  What are you gonna do?"  Jonathan committed to pray every day as well.  We offered to help, by sending a text reminder everyday...and they've been keeping it!!  I am so, so, so excited to continue teaching them both.

Changing topics: Elder Montgomery also employed our services in retrieving some more new Malibu's!  Driving new cars is always so fun.  One thing I noticed though, is that they don't have CD players.  Are CDs too old fashioned now?!  I remember when cassette players were still a thing!  I feel old.

Also this week, a member, Sister Smartt, called us and asked to take our picture for a newspaper article the Church is writing for the Book of Mormon play, which is coming to Nashville soon.  📰 (Brother Smartt is the head of the public affairs committee for the church, or something like that). She is BFFs with the Kovach's, a part-member family who we've been trying to see all of last transfer but haven't been able to meet because they just had a baby!  Miracle: Sister Smartt wanted a picture of missionaries teaching an investigator a lesson but we had no one we knew who'd be comfortable with that so Sister Smartt called up Sister Kovach and basically set up that lesson for us!  It was a wonderful introduction and a great set up for us to schedule more lessons with them in the future.

On Saturday, we had the wonderful experience of everyone we had planned to see, cancel on us. Everyone.  We made some calls and texts in the morning to confirm appointments and set some meetings up but they all fell through so we literally had no plans for the whole day, until 7pm.  It inspired us to be a bit creative in our finding activity and we decided to go to the park in the afternoon and chalk up several inspiring and spiritual messages on the pathways.  It was really fun and we saw some passersby curiously reading the drawings as they strolled or biked along the pavement.  Missionary work does not have to be (nor should it be) limited to tracting or formal teaching.  I'm so thankful and happy that I was able to use my creative talents and gifts to help spread the light of the gospel in various ways.

Saturday night was the Roadshow for the Nashville stake.  I remember doing the roadshow when I was in YW:). Roadshow always has such fun and unique memories with it.  All of the wards of the Nashville stake crowded into the stake center...our building...so the cultural hall was packed! This roadshow was especially fun to watch because I knew so many of the wards and people participating in the event...Old Hickory, Sunset, Green Hills, YSA, and Bellevue!  Oh my goodness, it was such a joy to see so many Bellevue members again!!!  It was a wonderful surprise reunion and I got to hug/handshake several of my favorite people that night, like the Perez's and the Epperson's. 🤗

I am so great full to be a missionary, to build and share my testimony everyday and to talk to so many people.  I'm especially grateful for the Spirit which is carried with me and testifies of gospel truths to those I meet, and I'm also thankful for the fun creative ways my companion and I spread light to the people in this community.

Sister Ririe

On Saturday afternoon, we decided to change up our finding
routine and go crazy with the chalk in the park.

Starvation is not even an option here.  The members feed us even when dinner appointents are cancelled.
This is a wonderful Korean soup and wontons that were dropped off, Sunday night.
It may not look like it, but those bowls were huge!!

Fall News (Nov 7)

Whoa.  October flew by so fast.  I can't believe we're already into November.  I'm seeing Christmas decor up in the stores and on some houses already.  

Hello!  

Fall colors are still everywhere and I'm enjoying every bit of warmth we still have before it gets cold.  🍃🍂🍁

Transfers information: both Sister Miller and I are staying in the area!  Phew.  I wasn't ready to leave this place quite yet.  There's still a lot of work to do around here.

Last Monday, we went window shopping around Nolensville and stopped by an Amish food mill.  Well, on Tuesday, we were driving back through Nolensville, after helping Sister Boardman with her curtain rods again, and Sister Miller had a random craving for an Amish chicken salad sandwich.  We pulled over so that she could satisfy her craving.  Whilst there, a woman named Julie, whom we'd seen and talked to on Monday, was working behind the register so we talked with her as Sister Miller was buying her chicken salad mix and Amish bread.  The conversation quickly turned towards church and Julie told us that she'd actually just moved back to Nashville, 4 days ago, and she's Episcopalian but she's looking for another church right now.  She was really interested in finding something that has a strong and supportive women's group (ding ding ding - Relief Society!) and found interest the opportunity to share her own testimony with others, rather than listen to a preacher each Sunday, give the same sermon over and over again.  We invited her to come visit our church and said she would, if not this week, then next.  Well, she didn't show up yesterday, so we're hoping that she'll make it next week.

Meanwhile, all is going well, here in Nashville.  I gave a talk last week in sacrament meeting, about member missionary work.  I ended up speaking for 10 minutes, rather than my planned, 5-6. The more experiences I accumulate in giving talks or trainings, the more I find I accidentally go over the time allotment I'm given.  It's a problem I didn't think I'd ever have to work on!

Love y'all!

Sister Ririe

P.S. Shout out to Jackson for turning 12 and receiving the Priesthood...congrats!  (Btw, you're growing up way too fast!  I remember pushing you down the street in a stroller!)