7 Months Down...where has the time gone?!

So yesterday was my 7 month mark (but I guess it would be today in the states haha). I can't believe how fast the time really has gone! It's crazy!

This week went pretty good! We started off the week in a different proselyting area with another sister missionary as our companion because her companion had finished her mission and went home a couple days early! We had a good time together being in a trio for a few days! They have heaps of investigators in their area so it was really fun having our days packed with lessons :)

This week we decided to try and contact some of the former investigators that we had in our area book and found a couple names we thought would be good! When we went to contact one of them it turned out that the lady had moved away, but then we started talking to the guy who had answered the door and he said he was interested in learning more!!! We were so pumped! So we will be trying to see him soon!

We also found someone to teach when we started chatting with the guy who pumped our gas for us! So we are learning to talk to everyone no matter what and the Lord really does work in mysterious ways!

So, good news!!! An area further south closed down, so a car was made available and we will be getting that this week! YAY! That was truly a tender mercy from the Lord cause not having a car to get to our far away places was starting to stress us out!

As for other news, a while ago the church released new rules on sister missionaries and wearing pants in certain missions during mosquito season to protect them ... well guess what everybody!!!!!! THE NEW ZEALAND WELLINGTON MISSION APPLIES!!!! So, if our mission president researches and finds that it would be safer for us to wear pants, we will be wearing pants this summer... I am SO not excited, hahaha more sisters are going to be dying from heat stroke than mosquito borne illnesses... BUT I guess that means I would kinda be making history.. hahaha so we will see.

So, last week being a tougher week for me I went to the scriptures to help me. I was reading in 2 Nephi Chapter 4 of the Book of Mormon. For those of us who are familiar with Nephi, we know that he is THE MAN. He never murmurs and seems to only be able to know the Lord's will. Well, in this chapter, Nephi gets pretty hard on himself, he talks about how every time he wants to rejoice he remembers his weaknesses and iniquities, and his heart groans as he thinks of his sins and short comings. But then in verse 27 he asks himself why he is letting those things get to him, why is he letting his enemies have a place in his heart and bring him down. Then later he says that he will put his trust completely in the Lord, that no matter his sins, afflictions, short comings, and weaknesses, he will always trust the Lord. It really made me think to myself that even though I felt down, and like I was in a trial, it shouldn't matter if my trust was truly in the Lord. Each day I am trying harder, and learning more about completely trusting the Lord, especially in missionary work, and I hope to someday be at a point like Nephi when I can just shake off my negativity and press forward.

Anyway, thank you so much for the continued support, love and encouragement! I appreciate it so much!! Love you all! Have an amazing week :)
Love, Sister Golden

Staying in Christchurch!

Hello Everyone,
SOOOOO... this week is Transfers!!!!1 AAAAAND... I am staying in Christchurch. So by the end of this transfer I will have been here for 8 months hahaha. Time has gone really fast here! It is crazy!
One of the Sister Training Leaders left a few days early to get ready for school, so her companion is staying with us for the time being.

So this week wasn't too busy for us, in fact I am a bit down about the work here. It feels like we are hitting lots of dead ends, and there isn't anyone to teach and the people we are kind of teaching are not progressing. It's tough, but that happens on the mission I guess.
I'm also feeling sad because one of my favorite families, the TePuke's are moving to Australia. I hate saying goodbye!

Anyway! This week's highlight for me was being able to offer some service at a memorial service. A lady in our ward, her father passed away unexpectedly from a heart attack. They are a hard out Maori family so the memorial was very cultural! After the service as the body was being carried out of the chapel and put into the car, the grandsons and a few others did a haka. It was SO powerful and hakas always make me cry, which this one especially did because they did it with such heart and emotion, even as tears were rolling down their cheeks, they were able to channel their inner culture and do this amazing thing for someone they loved a lot. I love the culture here. As the body was being driven away, his wife, did a special goodbye haka for him which had me all emotional again. It was such a beautiful thing to witness.

I have to go now! Love you all! Have an amazing week!

Love, Sister Golden

Fast Week!

So the days and weeks keep going by faster and faster! Next week is transfer week and I can't even believe I have been training Sister Snow for almost a whole transfer! The time truly flies out here! I will be coming up on my 7 month mark pretty soon here and it feels like I just got out of the MTC! haha

This week went by so quickly! On Tuesday we had a Zone Training meeting! It was SO good! We talked a lot about talking with EVERYONE and asking for referrals. I always love coming together as a Zone and learning together! I feel so pumped up and excited about the work after them and it's fun to apply the new things you learn!

Also, recently we have been having a pretty gross mold situation in our bathroom ceiling, yes, IN it! So we can't get to it very well to do anything. But this week, thankfully, they sent a guy to come and clean the mold and kill it with some STRONG bleach so our flat smelled like a pool after that! Then we had to air it out by leaving the windows open all day so that was a cold night... But, we are very glad it got taken care of!

Lately the work has been a bit of a let down. The people we were so excited to teach have kinda let us know that they aren't very interested in learning about the gospel to be baptized, but just to learn more about religion and the world. It is hard. As a missionary you have the ability to love these people so quickly, and when you know you have something that can make their lives SO amazing and they reject it, it sucks! But, we can just pray for them and keep hoping that the spirit will be able to change their hearts!

The Elders had an awesome baptism this week! A Samoan family were all baptized together! They are so sweet, and faithful and they just glowed that day! I was so happy to be a part of it! I love convert baptisms! The spirit is always so strong!

Last night a family in our ward had a birthday dinner for our recent convert Sam! It was really fun and he totally had an awesome time! He has kind of been needing a pick me up so it was really good to see him smiling and having fun with everyone!

One thing I am grateful for is the chance I have to serve with Elders over here! They are such a blessing! When Sam was struggling we couldn't do a lot at the moment because we have to have a female with us so we called the Elders and they went straight over and were able to give him a blessing and now they have been taking him to lessons with them! He is loving it! The Elders also have a female recent convert who we have taken to a few lessons with us so it works out well :)

This week I began the Book of Mormon again and I am marking specific things about Jesus Christ in it and it is making me realize how blessed we are to have this book, another testament of Jesus Christ to read and ponder. I am so grateful to be able to have this way to feel closer to my Savior!

Love you all! Have a good week!
Love, Sister Golden

It's Really Cold!!

HI!
I hope everyone is doing well and had an awesome week! This week was good for the most part :)

Sweet Story: So, a lady in our ward, Sister Thompson, was in the hospital a bit ago and met another woman there named Kay. She talked to Kay a bit about the gospel but then got discharged and didn't get to say goodbye. So, she wrote a note to her and looked up her address and gave it to us and asked us to drop it off to Kay. We went to see her and she was pretty hesitant to talk to us at all, but finally opened the screen door when we told her we had a note from her, ha! She read the note and immediately started crying and goes "The Lord really does love me, sending you here to me. Will you girls come back to see me?" It was so tender and sweet! We are going back to see her tomorrow :)

We also found 2 new investigators to teach this week! Danny and Raoul! They are Indian and are here for work. We had an awesome lesson about the Restoration with them. Danny is Catholic so he has a strong understanding of Jesus Christ, but Raoul is of Hindu background so this has been a really good experience to try and really help him understand Jesus Christ. The elders are having a convert family baptism this Saturday and Danny and Raoul said they would come! I am way excited!

So the bummers of this week. My knee is going to be okay! But the doctor advised me to go really easy on it so it can heal, but right after the appointment the STL's called to tell us they decided we didn't need a car anymore and they were going to give it to the Elders. We explained that that wouldn't actually work since I need to heal my knee, so we are actually going to be using the STL's car for 6 weeks! haha I am stressed out about what we will do after that though because our area really does require a car...

Our flat has so many leaks, ugh. There is a hole in our bathroom ceiling that's filled with mold! They are thinking of moving us to a new flat. The flats across the street are really nice. Kind of remind me of houses in Germany.

Last night was fun! We got to go to a big park in Christchurch and walk around for a light festival! Our recent convert Sam invited us to go and a few other members came along! Sam has been really struggling lately so we wanted to be sure we could go to help him feel loved! It was really pretty, but SO cold! The days here have been anywhere from -3 to 5 degrees celsius! AH!

It was a good week though and we are really excited to have some new people to teach! Being a missionary is always more fun when you are teaching a lot!

This week I was reading the General Conference talk that President Nelson gave in the Priesthood session about the Priesthood. It really helped me grasp how lucky we are to have the power and authority to act in God's name within our church, to call upon the powers of heaven! I am so grateful for the priesthood and all it has done in my life and that we are promised that it will never again be taken from the earth!

I hope you all are well! Love you!

Love, Sister Golden

6 Months Down?!!?

Yep, that's right, I have been a missionary in New Zealand for 6 months! It is actually so weird to think that because the time has gone SO fast! I am still in Riccarton, Christchurch where I started, but I have had 4 companions here! haha

This week was a pretty busy one! Sister Snow and I went on exchanges with the Sister Training Leaders. I was with Sister Christensen here in Riccarton. We had a great exchange! But, we accidentally got separated for part of it which was probably the scariest part of my mission! Before the mission I used to love being alone or going places by myself, it is interesting how your mind changes when you know you are supposed to be with someone at all times!

                                                                                 Our Training Leaders

So we were biking down our busy Riccarton road stopping and talking to tons of people along the way. As we got on our bikes to head off again I checked the time and saw our appointment was in a few minutes, so I told her that and we decided to bike straight there. I was in the lead since it was my area, and going at a good pace and probably made it 2 K's down the road and turned onto the street of our appointment and then looked behind me and saw NO ONE! My heart started to race and I got off my bike and began to walk toward the main road, and suddenly I see Sister Christensen bike past the road and just keep going and I am thinking oh no I am never gonna get to her! I start thinking, she doesn't know where she is, we have 1 phone and it's in my pocket, how long do I go until I have to call President?!?!! I keep walking toward the main road and walk the direction she was going, slowly, hoping she would have stopped and turned around or something! I walked for about 10 minutes before the phone rings and it's her!!!!!!!!! She had asked to use someone's phone and had to call her companion to get my number! hahaha she had biked about another kilometer and a half down the road until she stopped and found someone to call me! AHHH! We found each other again and figured out that she had stopped to talk with someone else and I didn't know and she didn't yell or ring her bell so I kept going on my merry way! hahah SO SCARY! But it turned out alright :)

Sad story of the week: I was at sports night playing volleyball and got low for a dig with my right leg stuck out to my right and as I went down my knee buckled toward the ground and I heard a nice loud pop. YIKES! So I got off the court and felt all wobbly and dizzy and thought immediately of my mom in my head and went "oh great, I tore my ACL like my mom" it started to get stiff and all uncomfortable after that. We made it home alright and I iced it a lot that night and didn't sleep well that night cause if I moved at all it hurt SO bad! The next morning it was SO stiff and it took me a long time to be able to walk on it.

                                                                Sports night - right before by accident!

That day we had a meeting and the Elders gave me a blessing and I was promised that I would serve a full mission so I know I will be okay :) I may have to go get it checked out, so prayers would be very nice right now that it won't be anything serious :) Thank you!

On Sunday we got to do a member missionary work shop as the 3rd hour block for the 5th Sunday! It went so well and I think we got a lot of the members pumped up to invite their friends to learn more about the gospel! I am hoping they keep the fire and don't let it fade! It would be so cool to get to teach our members friends :) I am excited! 

Sister Snow is growing each day and I am so glad I have the chance to be her trainer and see her progress! I love it!

This week, actually Saturday morning I was reading the Book of Mormon and I was really bummed about my knee, and I was reading in Ether Chapter 12 about faith, this scripture really stood out to me in verse 6 and it says, "...I would show unto the world that faith is things which are hoped for and not seen; wherefore, dispute not because ye see not, for ye receive no witness until after the trial of your faith." Whoa. I was so blown away by how specifically this scripture was speaking to me! I realized that this is just a minor setback in the work and that it is a test of my faith. It isn't easy, and it's not fun to have test and trials, but they do make us stronger, and I know the Lord will help me through this one :)

I love you all! Have an amazing week!
Love, Sister Golden

This is my friend from the MTC; he is serving in Perth, Australia. He is standing in front of the Pink Lakes in Kalbarri.

Being a Trainer!

Hello everyone!
So sorry I didn't get a letter out last week! My email logged me off and wouldn't let me get back in! But now I will cover both weeks in this letter :)

So I am a trainer now! 2 weeks ago I went to the airport to pick up my greenie, Sister Snow. She is from Utah! I love her a ton! She is a lot quieter than me.. haha but so diligent, obedient and hard working! We have a lot of fun together! It is really fun to watch her grow each day! I feel like everyday she gets a little more comfortable teaching and talking to people! I really enjoy being able to study the gospel with her and help her learn how to teach it simply!

                                                                                         Sister Snow

                                                                           Our new Riccarton Ward missionaries!

We have found some new potentials to teach and have taught a few investigators but the work is still a bit slow. We are excited though to keep meeting people and teaching more! We are still working a lot with less active members which can be SO hard sometimes, but we love them :)

Being a trainer has really forced me to grow and rely on the spirit more! Sister Snow can be timid sometimes so I always have to be ready to have her back or add some stuff to her teaching so the spirit has really been helping me fill in and take more of the lead! I have definitely noticed growth in the both of us! I am so grateful for this experience!

This week I have been reading toward the end of the Book of Mormon, after Jesus Christ visits the Nephites. It constantly amazes me how quickly the people turn their backs on God and his teachings and His prophets. I am so grateful to live in this day when the gospel has been restored in it's fullness and we have a prophet to lead and guide the church the way the Lord wants it.

I love you all! Thank you for the prayers and kind thoughts! Have a wonderful week!

Love, Sister Golden

Transfers

These are the last pictures of my favorite group of missionaries. They are all such great people!