Climb to Glory

Wow-za!!  This week has gone by so slow and yet so fast.  It has been jam packed with lots of little activities.  It wasn't the most productive week when it comes to teaching, but we did do a lot of service and working with members, so yayy!  Work with what you got!  :)

My Military Pass :)

So, at the start of the week we went back on Post (Ft. Drum) and we knew that it would be our main day to proselyte for the week.  So wanted to try to see everyone.   But, life happens while you are making other plans... and the Lord had 'other plans' that day for us.  We stumbled upon some very sad circumstances for one of the recent converts here.  She is only in her teens and has a very hard family situation.  She also hasn't been coming to church.  Typically, when we see her, we would read scriptures with her.. (which is slightly a pet peeve of mine.  I do much better as a missionary teaching doctrine and making things more interactive.  However, most people in New York struggle with their ability to read.. yup high illiteracy rates here.)  Her Mom slipped the hint that she has been suffering from depression and it has lead to self-harming.  We had a really powerful lesson with her about prayer and how when things get tough, we can't leave the safety of the 'tornado shelter and run into the storm/tornado' just because we are mad at God.  It does way too much harm to do that.  Overall, we had a good discussion and now we know how to help her.

Later, we visited some members homes.  By the way, mission rules do not allow us to hold any child under 6 years of age.  :(  I really struggle with that, I love little kids!  I interact with these families with the cutest kids and my internal mothering instinct has been screaming to play and hold these kids--but I can't.  I have quickly made a few primary age friends in the ward and we draw pictures during Sacrament Meeting when our investigators don't show up.  It is so fun to watch the parents resolve conflicts and teach them.  I've been taking mental notes on what does/doesn't work with kids.  Maybe it is because I am going to be turning 20 soon and the hope is to have a family within the next 6 years... so that's been really interesting.

But anyway... back to members.  This week I had this strong impression that we needed to visit one certain member.  She is in a position of leadership.  But something just seemed off.  Another member gave us the referral to go see her too.  When we got there, everything seemed to be fine.  And then... she just broke down.  Like literally broke down in tears.  If we hadn't visited her that day, she may have quickly went down the path of inactivity or done something tragic that she would regret later.  In many ways, I couldn't relate to what she was feeling, but I could testify that the gospel was the answer.  I then had the impression to take her two kids who were in the room and go play with them.  That was definitely needed to help the situation.  She couldn't fully open up to my companion and get guidance and help until I left with her kids.  So while my companion was providing a shoulder to cry on, the kids and I made "I love Mommy" letters and made lunch.  The feeling... of having an impression, following it, and knowing that you did what Jesus Christ himself would do in that instance is the most powerful feeling in the world.  It energizes you from the tips of your toes to the top of your head.

My companion and I were in better spirits this week and yeah, we may not have a huge pool of investigators, but we have many members who struggle and they matter just as much too!  :)  Work where you are needed!!

Wednesday was even crazier this week.  We drove down to Utica (which was so weird) and we had a zone training meeting on working with members.  Which is quite funny for us.. because as of right now... we have a brand new Bishop in his 30's, new counselors, no mission leader and the auxiliary leaders are either deployed or leave at the end of August.. well all except for the Young Women's leader.  So we just laughed and dreamed of a day when we can have a full Ward Council :)

Krysten's Baptism

We then drove back for the baptism of Krysten!! Yayy.  Her family is funny.  Typical military family with three kids.  They've been less active and the Elders sorta found them 2 months ago.  Krysten is 10 yrs old.  They have been slowly taught and before I got to Carthage, they were very lukewarm towards the Church.  But, apparently, the change just astounds my companion.  They went from almost no activity before to now  they now want to get sealed in the temple and pay tithing.  They also had us over for dinner.  They are super sad that they have to move to Texas for a month and one of us may be transferred next rotation.  Her baptism though was so fun!!

The Ivy Family 

Thursday we started with moving a super funny couple in the Ward. We moved a total of two families this week for a total of 10 hours of service.  Most of our appointments cancelled, so apparently that must have been what the Lord wanted us to focus on.  I am grateful for the years of moving with my family... (even though I hated it then), because #1) I am very flexible and I can form a relationship very fast with new people.  (That is probably why I don't stay in an area for very long, unlike some missionaries) and #2) I know how to pack and load a moving truck.  Thank goodness for Tetris.. it has helped too.  I spent most of the time rearranging cabinets and chairs and mattresses to maximize all of the square footage in the truck.  It  was actually kind of fun!

We also have the greatest elders serving with us right now in the whole mission.  They made it fun to work with them.  :)  Apparently, I will be getting my biceps back if I have to move a family at least once a week.  It will make up for not working out as much.

Moving families in Carthage

Friday was a carfast...and since we didn't live in our area, we decided to focus on administrative tasks.  Study up for our exchanges, make mini area books for the car and study for training's.

We also taught Young Women's this week.  It went awesome!!  We also have to train for District Meeting on the Plan of Salvation. So we have been busy and also having fun.

Hmmm... what else happened this week??  Oh and Bev, the Filipino Medic, came to Church again.  She loved the meetings and came with us for Young Women's.  She loved it!!  She said yes to an official lesson this week.  YES!!  Success!!  She also fractured her finger unexpectedly, so she won't be deployed now.  HA HA, God does work in mysterious way!! :)

The Church is true!!  This week is a trip to Watertown!! I am so excited!  Woop Woop!

Love ya!
Sister Kylie Williams

Behold A Royal Army

Hey Everyone!!

Just another week in Carthage.  It has been a relatively calm week, which I am okay with because the next two weeks are going to be crazy!  :)  However, this week I did have a baptism and a wedding!!  Fun Fun!!

Lexis' Baptism with Sister Duke and myself

 Now we are preparing for another baptism and wedding this week on Wednesday.  The girl getting baptized is named Krestyn and her family is coming back into reactivation and she is 10 years old.  Her 8 year old brother is being baptized as well.  They live on base and have quickly become our friends.  The kids are quirky and cute and I have gotten to teach Krestyn most of the commandments and ordinances.  That has been the main teaching focus.

Also this week, we got a completely new Bishopric.  There was no leadership when I first got here.  So all there was when I arrived was a 2nd counselor over 150 active members.  Kinda hard to do much.  Now that we have a Bishop, hopefully we will get a ward mission leader, but things are a little slow to catch up here, so we will have to patiently wait.

We have been visiting a ton of less-actives and recent converts on base.  That is the bulk of this area, part members and less actives.  Most of our investigators are still out of town on vacation, so we haven't been able to contact them.  People will start coming back and moving in around August so things will go much faster.  A big thing here we have focused on is temple attendance.  Not many of the members have been to the temple. So me and Sister Duke are trying to get everyone on a "Yayy!!  Temple and Family History are great" kick!  We should be helping some people with their Family History soon.  :)

Another big thing for us has been making banana bread for some less actives or people that won't let us in the door.  We did get into a door that we haven't gotten into lately and we taught the "B___" Family.  They are slightly crazy and suffer from poor financial circumstances, but we taught the whole family the Restoration and the son who is 10 is scheduled to be baptized at the end of August now.  So that was fun!

I also got to meet an investigator named Mary Lou.  She is super cute and came to church for the first time ever!!  She also paid $100 dollars in fast offerings and kept asking me when the 'basket' was going to come around.  I just laughed and said, "We do things a little more privately and orderly in the Church."  She LOVED that so much.

And Bev came!!  Even though we hadn't seen her all week, she has all of these crazy field tests coming up.  She mentioned a possible deployment within the next three months and now the goal is to get her scheduled to be baptized within the next 6-8 weeks.  She feels the Spirit and without really being taught by us, she knows that the Church is the "safest and happiest she's ever been in, at any church."  So once she understands everything, she will be a super solid member.

We had 3 investigators at Church!!  Neither of us have ever had 3 investigators at Church at once before.  It was so sweet!  We also had some great dinner lessons with members.  A member said that she is going to teach us some self-defense and how to get out of kidnapping situations.  She then began providing us with certain legal striking weapons for the State of New York, since pepper spray and stun guns are illegal.  One of the pros of being in a military ward, everyone thinks that we are either starving or going to get kidnapped, so they feed us or teach us how to break someone's hand in certain situations.  I am not complaining, if I ever get transferred to downtown Albany or East side Syracuse, I won't be worried at all. :)

Me and Sister Duke

This next upcoming week is going to be crazy.  A 5 hour Zone training meeting, a baptism, helping members move, a carfast (I have to walk and not use the car.. and we don't live in our teaching area.. yikes) and we have a ward pioneer celebration coming up.  There will be a watermelon eating contest and we get to run some of the activities.  Then, the week after that, I will be on a 3 day exchange in Watertown (which I am so excited to go and see).  Then, Mission Leadership Council and President Rogers is going to lay down the hammer, and change up everything.  Hopefully nothing too crazy.  President Wirthlin has done a great job with the mission.

There are about 5 billion mosquitoes here and we may be slowly eaten alive... we purposely eat garlic powder to keep them away...but if our investigators also start being repelled, we may have to cut back on the garlic.  Haha.

And hmm.... what else is new... here is a shout out to the awesome friends back home in the Reunion Ward that are going out on their missions this month.  Go get 'em Kacee, Erin and Chandler!!

Love you all, The CHURCH IS TRUE!!
Sister Kylie Williams

We are all Enlisted... Literally !!!

Hello everybody!

Greetings from my new area of Carthage, New York.  Nothing like being in my third area and being on my 4th Companionship in 8 months!  Most Sister's have 3-4 areas their entire mission.  I am pretty sure that the Lord just likes to spread me around everywhere.  At my current rate, I will have close to 6-7 service areas for my mission.  HA HA.  But, it just means I get more people to love !!

I really do consider myself really fortunate.  The Lord has blessed me with really amazing experiences and people.  Now, I get the unique opportunity to work with one of the bigger wards in New York and serve on a military base and the surrounding ex-military areas.  It is super cool.  I just love it.  This area has the most members, less-actives, part-member families than any other area I have served in.  We work primarily with the Army wives and the families so I need to brush up on the kid lessons.  I haven't really taught families or kids on my mission.  It is always been single adults or older couples.  That is a new learning curve for me.

6 days a week, we work on the Fort Drum Army Base.  It is so cool once we are inside and we've cleared the security gate/clearance--because it looks like I am back out west.  Cute maintained homes and everyone is nice and friendly.  The only weird thing is that we cannot actively proselyte on the Base.  We even have to take off our missionary name badges !! Another weird thing is that when we go to meet someone we made an appointment with, we can only say our names and ask if someone is a certain person/name.  Then we have to wait for them to invite us inside before we can start talking about anything like Church.    I feel so naked without my name tag on, it is  FREAKY !!  Instead of the standard Missionary Name Tag,  I have to wear a "military clearance pass" tag.  Yes, they did a Dept. of Defense background check right in front of me...slightly freaky, but thankfully, I am as clean as a bar of soap :)

Due to recent changes in boundaries and apartments, we are living in the wrong area and are currently burning through our monthly miles allocation just to get back to our service area.  All we need to do is give the Watertown, NY Elders a new apartment and everything will be solved.  Everyone here within a 45 miles radius is army or ex-army.  We go outside and everyone is either in military fatigues or in redneck clothing with a shotgun.  Hooah!!    Soooo.. that's been new.

My area is so very different compared to the rest of New York.  There are actually young families here.  We easily had like 120+ people at Church this week.  Most families had 2-5 kids and/or were pregnant.  Since it is the summer block leave and PCS (when soldiers get deployed or change forts) the ward was actually thin.  It was scary to have to learn so many more people.  Sadly, most people were standoffish because they move every 6 months to 3 years.  So, I grabbed a 6 month old ward list and my companion laughed and said, half of those people don't even live here anymore.  CRAZY.  Everyone we work with for the most part (90%) are super cool and normal.

We also have one of the coolest investigators.  Her name is Bev and she is a PV-class two Army medic that is best friends with some recent converts.  She just started investigating the Church.  She has already come to Church 3 times and I gave her a Book of Mormon to read.  We just need to get her to switch from being agnostic to being a Mormon.  She is my favorite 22 year old Filipino I've ever met.  Such a firecracker... but trying to work to clear her dirty mind after living on the barracks for the last 2 years will be a challenge.

Speaking of baptism, we had a 9 year old get baptized on Saturday.  Easiest baptism of my life!  I just showed up... taught her about tithing and temples and filled a font and took a picture.  I wish the others would have been that easy.  HA HA.  She didn't take the lessons until her father got back from deployment.  We also have 2 more potential kid baptism this month depending on the father's plans and if they show up to Church.  Boy, I love part member families. The are so cool.  We are teaching a Korean wife of a member who is deployed and she will get baptized soon; but the language barrier is hard.  Thankfully, we have a few Korean military members in the Ward who come to translate for us.

Oh... also.. on base .. every couple of hours a loud siren goes off.  In Carthage, the sirens go off every hour to remind the soldiers what time of day it is so they can program their bodies to sleep right at 8:30 and wake up at 4 am. IT IS SO WEIRD.  I feel like an airstrike is coming or something.. but it is just a time clock that the military uses.  Weird.  I don't understand military lingo at all and feel so dumb sometimes it is hilarious.  Thankfully, that is why we have companions.

Also, the other big thing this week, I went to a vow renewal of some members and that was a BLAST.  It was a barn wedding and it looked like something straight off of Pinterest!  So this week, I had my first wedding, my first kid baptism, and lots of military clearances, protocol and sirens.  CRAZY!  Hmm....  and the rest... trying to unpack, catch up on sleep and figure everything out.  Good things to come... love you all.

The Church is True :)
Love Sister Kylie W.

Permanent Change of Station

Hi everyone,

This week has been a little on the mild side.  With holidays and everyone traveling, it has been harder for us missionaries because people are either gone or are busy with family visits.  But, we went to many very cool events this week.

Me and "Livvy" (Olivia) 

However more importantly... I got a call to serve in Carthage, New York and will work a lot around Fort Drum on the Army military base.

 I am so excited!  I have LOVED every single member service man/woman since coming to New York!  My new companion is Sister Duke.  She is very laid back so that will be fun!!  I get to go way up north and I hope to see the autumn colors at their finest come fall! :)  Yayy!  But, with the trend of how the Mission President  keeps moving me, it looks like I will be up in the Potsdam area by Thanksgiving.  Show Shoes anyone???  Potsdam would put me in the top northern part of the mission/State of New York.  BRRRR!

I am very excited through for the new assignment and I get to be a Sister Training Leader again!  YESSS!  I also get to experience Watertown, NY and Gouverneur, NY.  I will be working with lots of Sisters and also with the military relations senior couples.  They are my favorite.  They have the best sense of humor and make a mean bowl of chili.

I got to meet President and Sister Rogers on Wednesday for the first time.  President Rogers is a beast.  He stands at 6 ft 6 inches and is this jolly, bald guy that isn't afraid to tell you to 'straighten up and fly right'.  He loves planning and wants to change up the leadership in the mission.   That will be so exciting because now I can return to the monthly leadership meetings and help shape the mission for the next couple of years.  Sister Rogers is very business like and slightly overwhelmed and homesick.  But, I'll give her 3 months and she will be awesome at everything!

I am so happy and kinda glad to be leaving the urban setting of Utica.  I was starting to pick up slang that wasn't the best.  Back up to rural country for me!  I will have to pack more bug spray though.   Apparently, the Lord likes to send me to an area for 3-4 months, tear it up and get things moving, and then I get transferred.  But, now I get to see a lot more of the mission territory which will be fun!

The less-actives are doing great.  We have two progressing families that are slowly changing and wanting to come back to church.  Yay!  As for the  investigators, we did some tracting, placed a few pamphlets and Books of Mormon.  But, Tim who is an Ojibwa Indian, is committed to be baptized in August and he is doing great.  I am going to miss him.  Meg, sometimes drifts back into her St. Louis harsher ways and even though she puts up her tough "I used to be a drug dealer, gang member" facade... I have come to see the squishy spiritual side of her that loves the Church. Sadly, she had a chance to be a full ride scholarship to play soccer at UCLA and become a lawyer also.  I have learned a lot about choices.  Don't give up on the things you want later down the road, to sacrifice for the desires of today. It doesn't work out.  But, I am hoping she gets baptized within the year.  Heather, our pot belly pig-- roller derby manager, is doing great and loves the Church.  Hopefully she will want to get baptized soon.  She acts so much like a member already, it is crazy.  Greg the woodcarver is up north and we miss him a lot.

This week we did member work also.  Especially with the 4th of July.  We went to a flag retirement ceremony and also a huge BBQ at a members house.  The members are ex-air force intelligence and they live on this big farm.  For about 4 hours we hung out with the members, retired the flag (the right and proper way; it was very respectful and even a spiritual moment; we had speeches and everything).  We did relax and have fun.  I have probably eaten like 10 hot dogs this week. HAHA.

Flag Ceremony and BBQ - Utica

Also on the 4th, we had other appointments here and there, but we hung out with some members that just returned from Sweden this week (and we got Swedish Viking souvenirs!)

The Beauchet Family - One of my favorite families!

 We also made flag cakes and watched all the fireworks!

The devotionals this week were mostly dedicated to agency and how when we use our agency and freedom appropriately, we protect our liberties.

Saturday I got the call to be transferred, so many of the members wanted to get together and eat and take pictures.  That was fun!  I have a lot more packing and cleaning ahead of me the next 2 days.

Remember that 'hairy' guy we found on accident and referred him to the Elders?? Well, apparently, he had some personal revelation with the Book of Mormon and really wants to get baptized now.  He called us and thanked us over the phone for finding him.  (ha, more like the Lord found you!)  That kind of phone call, totally made our day. It also compensated for the sadness we had over losing 2 other investigators that we were very attached to.  I have never cried about getting dropped before.  But, I learned so much looking back on the experience.  I realized that they were not really prepared.  They were looking for a church that reflected their beliefs instead of trying to find a church that had the truth.  Yeah, ice cream was eaten that day.

Sign in Bridgewater, NY

I also got to go on an exchange with Sister Dahl and worked the day in Waterville and Bridgewater NY.  It was sweet.  We just worked hard and found some great potential investigators.  My favorite experience during the exchange was with this man named Kirk.  He was a nice guy, but when we knocked on his door, he was like.. "eeh, I don't mean to be rude... but, I don't know what I believe and I don't want to waste your time."   Then the Spirit kicked in... the next thing I know, I am talking to him about the apostasy and how anciently, organized religion was a way to get money and power from people.  But Christ's Church has been restored, and it IS NOT about getting power and money.  Instead, it is about spiritual direction and help.  Then, I quoted JS-History and the next thing you know, he wanted a Book of Mormon and said he wanted to read it.  So finally after being out on my mission for 6 months, I finally know how to answer the questions of "I hate organized religion" and how to answer that by relating it to the restoration!!!  It was so sweet.

Also, we have this semi investigator named Rob.  He will be a Stake President one day, but he is only 22 and is going to college.  We found him tracting like 2 months ago and he left for college and we thought that we would never see him again.  HA!  On the 4th we both kept having the impression to go to his house and check up on him.  He was home for the holidays and it was great that we went because we taught him how to pray and how to spiritually seek for truth and not just read everything in the internet.  He was researching religions like you would research for a new car.  You CANNOT do that.  It can only come from spiritual witnesses that accompany the act of agency.  Ask direction questions in prayers like "Is this true?  Should I do this?  Read the scriptures with the question "Is this true?'  Go to church and ask, "Does the Lord really want religion to be organized this way?  Live the commandments and notice the difference and BOOM, you have a testimony.  So instead of him stopping his search, he then wanted a plan of salvation pamphlet and said that he'd pray about everything every night. He said he was praying about other religions while away at his college classes.  He wanted to become fully committed to the Church if he received a witness if it was true.  Spirit of the Lord for the Win!!  That was so cool!

As of next week, I will be in Carthage, New York surrounded by the Thousand Lakes region and more trees than in Utica (which was a lot to begin with).

I love you all and have a happy Summer!