Letter Date 9/01/14

Dear Everyone,

 

So this is my 6th day in the mission field (instead of counting down the days I am counting up).  Things have been going great so far.  My trainer, Sister Zenger, is from Salt Lake and she is going home in January so I am her last trainee, she has trained 2 other times.  She is super amazing and teaching me a lot, and she is always the Sister Training Leader and so we are always super busy.  Something that she told me is that for my first week as a missionary we are doing great.  My first day here (Wednesday) we got a guy to commit to baptism on the 20th and two hours after we got to our apartment I taught my first lesson!!! So that was pretty exciting and I am loving it so far.

The guy that is set for baptism on the 20th is an older guy.  He is super nice and the best way to explain him is by calling him Bill Cosby.  Really he is  a lot like him and he is super funny and nice.  My companion has been trying to get him to come to church for the past four weeks and he wouldn't come, but guess what, yesterday he came!!!! It was so great :) Sister Zenger was crying and so excited that he finally came.  He had a great time and said that he is coming back next week so that is a good sign.  What he told us yesterday is that our church has a wonderful feeling about it and that is what he wants.  I am very hopeful that he will get baptized and I have faith that he will be a great Mormon :).

We have a couple of other people that we are teaching its just hard to get them to do much because they all have really hard lives.  One lady we are teaching, her husband got murdered the night after their youngest daughter turned 9.  Then our other lady has had a hard life since she was a young girl. It is so cool to see the gospel change the lives of these people.  They notice that Heavenly Father is blessing them and that he is their for them.  Some of the time they are slow to accept it, but they still see the great change that it brings to their lives and the happiness.  It is what missionary work is all about, building and lifting others. helping them become the best people that they can be. Its just that everything takes time.

Well I will tell you about one last person, she is probably my favorite person that we have taught so far she is amazing.  She is looking for a faith to belong to, but she has to know everything about anything before she will join.  Her faith in God is so amazing, she knows that when she prays that Heavenly Father will lead her to the church he wants her to join so she is studying all the different churches and prays about them.  She has so much trust in the Lord that it amazes me.  I want the faith and trust that she has in her Father in Heaven, ya I have faith and I trust him, but I don't think it is as much as hers.  She is super amazing and she wants to keep learning more and more.  I know that one day she will make it to our church, but when that time is I don't know, but I have faith that she will come to know the true gospel.

Missionary life is great and I am loving every minute of it.  I am grateful to be out here on the Lord's time and know that is taking care of everything and everyone back home.  I am grateful for this opportunity and I know that it will bless me and my family.  I love you all and here are some pictures of my MTC district.  I miss them like crazy! But we are all doing what we are supposed to be doing. 

Love,

Sister Amy Calton

P.S. More pictures to come later I promise!!!! :)

We weird picture is my companion Sister Zenger.

Letter date 8/19/14
Dear everybody,

I am really loving the MTC. It was super hard the first day and saying good by to my family.  I didn't want to leave them and say goodbye, but we all have to do things that sometimes we don't want to do.  I have two companions and I love them dearly.  they are super great.  Sister Amos is from Layton Utah and she actually has the same birthday as me, which she is the first person that I have met that has the same birthday as me.  Crazy right? Ya it is.  Sister Lavea is from New Zeland and she laughs at our "American" culture a lot.  Its ok though because we make fun of the words that she says all the time :).  Our Elders are the best ones in the field.  They take really good care of us and are always super nice.  Elder Benham is our district leader and then his companion is Elder West.  Then there is Elder Riplie and his companion is Elder Faniu and he is also from New Zeland.  They are really nice and yesterday they gave all us sisters blessings.  It was really nice cause none of them have given many blessings before, so they now have some experience.  Something is special about the way their hands shake when they were giving the blessings.  Really good experience.

Any ways the MTC has been awesome.  Other than the first day.  It is a very strict schedule but it makes the time fly.  The teachers are amazing and they are all really nice to us. They think our district is one of the best here because we are all so willing to learn and work with each other.  We all just get along great.  The food now on the other hand, I feel like they feed us WAY too much, and then they sit us in a classroom with out much exercise time.  I really think they are trying to fatten us up (which for some people they might need it. Elder West thinks he does.) The days here seem long but after a while you lose what day you did things and when you did them early that day you think you did them days ago.  So as Elder Benham likes to say, "It drags on but it flys by." Which is so true. Hard to think that we will have been here a week tomorrow!!!! :) Then out to Sacramento California, which by the way everyone in my district is going!!! :) We are all glad that we aren't going to be separated by too much space. 

Just one more thought before I have to go, I was reading in my scriptures last night and I had a thought.  Coming on the Lord's mission, I had to give up a year and a half of my life, family, friends, free time, movies, phones, school, etc.  But when I came to earth, Heavenly Father had to give me away to a world filled with sorrow, pain, temptations, and sin.  But he found a way for me to be safe and to return back to him, the atonement of Jesus Christ.  I am so grateful to him for that and I know that is gospel is true and what I am doing is what I am supposed to be doing.  So love you all and can't wait to hear from all of you! Have an amazing week!!!

Love, 

The other Sister Calton (Amy) :)