Sending Sister Huang Home and Getting a New Companion

Happy New Year friends and family!  :)  I hope you all had a great Christmas!

Christmas as a missionary was definitely a different but great experience.  I felt like I was more able to focus on the Savoir this Christmas and the difference he makes in so many people's lives! :) 

We got our transfer calls last night.  I sent Sister Huang back to China (tear) and it was so hard to tell her goodbye!  But I will be staying in Spokane West Cheney YSA and my new companion will be Sister Jessica Johnson!  She is from Utah and she actually was my old Sister Training Leader in Moscow!  She will be the new STL here in Spokane West and I'm SO excited to work with her!  She is a great missionary and an awesome leader. 

I'm excited for the college students to FINALLY come back after the Christmas break!  We will be real busy and the work here will pick up a ton when they finally come home! :)

Thank you for all you do!

Love you all!

Sister Worthen  :)

This is the famous red wagon at
River Front Park in Spokane

Christmas at the River Park Square

Our snowman.  Yeah, it looks
like I have an arrow through my head

Sisters in our zone out to breakfast

The sisters in our zone all get along great!

Dog named Buddy

Outside the institute

Missionaries at the Stake Presidents
home on Christmas day

Sister Huang loves Minions

Christmas Skype Call with Sister Worthen

Hi, this is Sister Worthen's Dad.  Today is Christmas day 2015.  We had the opportunity to have a Skype call with Sister Worthen today.  It was so great to talk with her, and to see how she is doing.  I've included a few pics below and a short video from that call.  Merry Christmas!

Merry Christmas from Cheney Washington!

Hi family and friends!

Merry Christmas!!!!  I hope you all have a great holiday!!!  :)

This week has been such a great one!  We got to go with Maddie to the distribution center to help her get all of her temple clothes!  After that, Maddie took us to a Hong Kong Chinese Buffett.....yikes, that was culture shock for me!  There were clams and sushi and little baby octopuses (octopi?), and all sorts of weirdness.  Sister Huang was in heaven, haha.  :)  I tried some of it, but decided to stick with noodles and rice.  :)  Later in the week, we got to go through the temple with Maddie and be her escorts for her endowment.  We got to see it in Mandarin Chinese too which was amazing!  Sister Huang will finish her mission this week and head back to China, so she ended on the most rewarding high note!

I'm nervous to get my new companion and I'm going to miss Sister Huang like crazy, we're super close and it will be hard having her go!  But I'm excited for the growth that comes with change as well.  I'll also be super happy when all of the college kids get back in town after the break and all of our investigators come back!  :) 

We had exchanges this week, and I was able to go with Sister Griffith in her area, the Sunset Ward.  I learned a lot today from Sister Griffith!  She has only been out one transfer longer that I have so we are both fairly new.  She is so emotionally invested in her area and the work, and I love that about her!  The day started off a little rough with absolutely no one being home, but as we continued on slowly one by one we were able to see miracles happen.  :)  We contacted a potential family who set up a return appointment with us, taught a less active, met with two investigators, and had an awesome dinner appointment!  :)

Oh, and Elder Gingles (a missionary in my zone) and his companion had the creepiest thing in the world happen to them!  Someone broke into the elder’s apartment and put pictures of brain scans on Elder Gingles desk with a note saying that they were being controlled and they should want their life back, and to call them to help them.  Basically it’s like something out of “Criminal Minds”.  Needless to say, the elders are moving to a different apartment now.  :)

Our ward did it’s Sunday Christmas program this week, and it was really good, except we were supposed to have two investigators at church today and neither of them came.  :(  It broke my heart.  It’s so discouraging to work so hard and not be effective at all......ugh.  Hopefully next week we’ll get investigators at church.  John is on date for his baptism in January though!  We are excited for that!

Also thank you all so much for your Christmas cards and gift cards!  They really have meant the world to me (getting mail is super exciting no matter what, it makes my day :) ) thank you for thinking of me!!!!!!  Especially the Turners, Hanks, Oliversons and my ward for sending me Christmas cards and making me feel loved.

I'm super excited to Skype my family and be able to see them on Christmas! I love you all!

If you haven't seen it yet, check out "A Savior is Born" on christmas.mormon.org :)  It's the Church Christmas video this year and it's the one we use on our pass along cards. I promise if you watch it, that it will bring the spirit in so strongly this Christmas season!

I love you all!  :)  Merry Christmas!

Love,

Sister Worthen :)

We wrote our pass along card message
"A Savior is Born" on the bush, just to convert
anyone who walks by.  :)  You gotta do what you
gotta do to speed the work along.  :)

Last time at the temple with my best
Chinese friend in the world!  So sad for her
to go home this week.  :(

Such an amazing opportunity to go with
Maddie to the temple today, and be her
escorts for her endowment.  I love that lady!

The octopus that I tried (gagged down) at the Chinese Buffet

Went to the dentist this week, and got to wear these
cool sunglasses that keep the bright light out of your eyes.
I guess Sister Huang thought this was funny. :)
No cavities!

What my name tag looks like in Chinese

Sister Huang's first snowman.  Thanks for the goldfish,
Kade.  They were much needed as the snowman
eyes and buttons.  :)  Notice we also gave him a
pass along card just for good measure.  :)

Sister Huang insists on scrapping the
car every morning because "she
won't get a chance to do something
that fun in China when she goes back".
I'm not complaining.  :)

Beautiful Christmas tree at the
River Park Square in Spokane

Andy's Baptism and Merry Christmas!

Hi family and friends!

This week has been a great one, our Investigator Andy got baptized this week!  Woo!!  It was such a great experience and he was so excited and happy.  It's amazing to see how the Lord moves his work forward in areas of the world where the missionaries aren't able to teach.  Andy is from a part of Asia where missionaries aren't allowed in right now.  He came to America for a year as an exchange student and is staying with a family in our area!  He is YSA age and Chinese so we were able to teach him.  When he goes home he will be able to share the gospel with his friends and family there!  I officially am getting my Chinese name tag this week and I can bear my testimony in Mandarin and say simple sentences.  It's coming slowly, haha.

We also go to go with James (our recent convert who was baptized two weeks ago) to the temple to do baptisms for the dead with him!  It was super cool and he loved every part of the temple.  This coming week we get to go with Maddie (a recent convert of almost a year) to get her endowment with her!  We have been teaching her temple prep in broken English and Chinese.  We went to Spokane Valley to help translate Maddie’s temple recommend into Chinese.  The Spokane temple is really tiny, but it’s so peaceful.

A hard part from this week was our investigator who was supposed to get baptized this weekend just found out that she has liver failure and has to move to Seattle for treatment so her baptism is being pushed back awhile.  I hope she is ok and it's really disheartening but it just goes to show how much the adversary really doesn't want people to get baptized.  :(  She did call our ward mission leader and wanted to meet with us and Bishop Neilson, and that she wanted a blessing.  I was happy that she turned to the church and Heavenly Father to help her.  J  We’ve definitely seen her faith grow.  Any extra prayers for her would be appreciated!

We also had another disappointment the other day.  Sister Huang and I went on a split with members so she could teach a lesson in Chinese, and I could give a church tour to a potential investigator.  I called him and he said that he was on his way, and he would call when he got to Cheney.  I was so excited and a little nervous for my first church tour by myself.  J  I ran around turning all the lights on in the building, setting up two sacrament trays, opening the baptism font.  As I waited for him I rehearsed the commitments and the testimony I wanted to share, I was so excited!  I thought for sure Heavenly Father was blessing us with a new investigator because we have been working hard and have been obedient.  J  I waited, and waited….and waited.  After a long time, the member I was with softly told me that she didn’t think he was coming.  My heart broke, I was so disappointed.  L

One highlight from this week was teaching John.  He is a referral from a member, but he works crazy long hours as the manager of a trucking company.  So a lot of times he doesn’t even get off work until after our missionary curfew.  Anyway, we finally set an appointment with him!  We taught him about the Book of Mormon and he talked about how he needs to read it every night.  And we put him on date for baptism right there for January 16^th.  Somehow Heavenly Father keeps blessing us with people to teach and baptize, even with the students being gone over the break!  J

I FINALLY got a letter from Brittin this week too!!!!  So that was a highlight! :) 

Oh, and one other thing…. the roof blew off of the post office here, so the mail is backed up by 5 days or more.  We had winds again about 75 miles an hour.  Hopefully you’ll get my written letters soon, but they may be delayed!

Well I love you all! Thank you for all of your love and support during Christmas time! 

Love,

Sister Worthen :)

Merry Christmas from the
sisters in Cheney

Andy's baptism

White elephant gift party

YSA Work a Bit Slow For the Holidays, But Still Small Miracles Every Day!

Hi friends and family!

This week was kind of a slow one, but still good!  All of the YSA age kids are headed home for the holidays so it's a bit slow here investigator wise!  There was maybe like ten people in sacrament meeting is all!  Definitely a change from the big wards in Utah.  We have a new investigator this week though!  Her name is Daisy and she is golden!  Hopefully she will progress and we will be able to put her on date for baptism! 

We have another baptism coming up on Saturday!  His name is Andy, and he's doing great!  He is a foreign exchange student from China.  :)  I'm so excited for his baptism!  Our recent convert James (who was baptized this week) is going to the temple on Wednesday to do baptisms for the dead and we get to go with him!  And then Maddie (another recent convert) is going through in two weeks to get her endowments so we'll get to go to that as well!  I love this work, and even though the holidays will be a bit slow for the YSA work there are still small miracles that we see every day!  :)

Thank you to the Young Women and Young Men in my ward back home!  I got a Christmas card from the youth and I loved it!  It's sitting on my study desk now.  :)

Thank you for your love and your support, especially during the holidays!  I love you all!

Have a great week!

Love,

Sister Worthen  :)

Sister Huang and I with our
tree from home

Gingerbread houses from care package

Sister Huang with her
calendar from home