Transfers & Temple Service

Hello everyone!!

Okay, this morning we had Transfer Conference....ah! I was pretty nervous to find out what was going to happen to me.  My new companion is Sister Palmer from California and she's from MY MTC group!  We are both going to be in our 3rd transfer and I'm so excited to be with her!  We are also the Phone Coordinators of Temple Square (every companionship has phones since that's how we communicate about tours, spreading announcements, etc.)  I get to be on the Square a lot this next transfer!  And I am moving to a new apartment which is MUCH nicer than what I live in now.  Overall, looks like it will be a fun, exciting transfer!  Not to mention that it will be the Christmas season, aka lights and thousands of people at night. So stoked!

Getting ready for the Christmas crowds

A few funnies:

We, the trio, went downstairs in the North Visitor's Center and started talking to this cute family.  They had a little boy who was about 1 1/2 and whenever he meets someone he sticks out his hand to shake hands.  It was the cutest thing!  He shook our hands each one time and then went back and shook ours for a second time. Haha.   The older brother (8yrs) looked just like Daniel when he was 8! Tan, big head, cute smile and all. Haha. Ah, made me miss my little brother :)

Sister Tiritilli thought Sister Asay should practice her future wedding picture poses.

Sister Liao (one of the funniest sisters here-who I love!) was playing with my hair earlier today and said, "Wow, you're hair is so soft!"  I told her thanks and, after another minute of playing with it, she then said "I miss my dog." Haha...great. 

There is a couple, John & Alice (* names changed), that Sister Walsh and Sister Jones met a week before I joined their trio and we called them Saturday afternoon to talk to them and teach them more about the Gospel.  Only John answered because his wife had taken the night shift at the hospital she worked at and was now taking a nap.  We started talking about their visit to Temple Square and their thoughts about it, as well as their plans for the Holidays.  We talked about his family and their dogs.  They have 2 dogs, but sadly one passed away and he explained to us that it was like losing a child (which I totally agree with) and that the other dog was sooo sad for weeks!  He kept talking about his dogs and the comfort and happiness they always bring him.  We could feel through the phone how much he cared about them!

At this point, we had been talking about his pets for a while and I knew we needed to bring the conversation back to the Gospel somehow, and it was at that moment when I had the prompting to bridge from dogs to the Gospel by relating their dogs to the Holy Ghost (the Comforter)....at first I was like "Um....come again?"  But, like I mentioned in my last email, I promised to follow every prompting so I asked John if he feels the unconditional love that his dogs have for him and he answered "Oh yes!" and I then talked about how God has so much love for us and uses the Holy Ghost, through comfort and guidance, to show us that love.  I described how our dogs are always there as a support for us, like the Holy Ghost, and that a dog's unconditional love for his owner is like God's perfect and unconditional love for His children.  Funny as this seems, it totally made sense to John!  He was agreeing with me and he seemed to really understand the immense amount of love that Heavenly Father has for His children. It was truly inspiring to me that God knows each of His children and knows what way is best for us to teach and relate to our investigators!  After we had this conversation, we shared our testimonies about the Book of Mormon and invited him to read it.  He agreed!  We (well, technically Sister Jones since we are splitting up) are calling him in a week or two to follow up! :)

Music & The Spoken Word!  Such happy times!!

Oh! We got to do Temple Service today!!  Temple Service is where we get to go into the SLC Temple and help clean.  I was assigned vacuum duty for the first part of our time there and it was the best!  It was just me and my jet-pack type vacuum and the stairs.  I did that for about an hour and a half in two parts of the Temple.  I sang a few hymns as I was working and, even though the vacuum was going, it was seriously such a spiritual experience! There was literally not a worry on my mind and I was so content and at peace.  At one point, I started singing "I Know My Redeemer Lives" and I started tearing up.  With the Christmas season approaching, we have been focusing even more on Christ (Christ is always the main focus) and in Zone Meeting we watched a very powerful video about Christ and what he endured that had a talk by Elder Holland voicing over the video.  After watching, I felt a deep sense of love and humility.  Humility because whatever we go through in our lives, it will NEVER match that of what Christ went through for us.  And Love because Christ suffered and did all of that for me, for everyone. So, being in the Temple, the House of the Lord, and singing that hymn was such an amazing experience.  I know that Christ lives and that He will come again.  He is our advocate, our brother, and I couldn't be happier to have His name over my heart as I serve as a missionary for the next 14 months.

I love you all!!

Sister Asay