Pues como está? Espero que todo esta bien y que sus vidas estan llenas de gozo. Les quero mucho!!!!! So because Labor day was on Monday I was not able to go to the library to write my email and yesterday we had exchanges so I was in another city called Overland Park, Kansas. So. I am writing today. My experience in Overland Park yesterday was crazy! This city is one of the wealthiest in all of Kansas so we actually tracted in an area with multi-million dollar homes...pretty much the exact opposite of what we do here in KCK. Yeah. I missed my area very badly. People were not friendly at all to us there. We did find a couple of people that were in the lower income parts of the area but it was still crazy because the lower income parts of that area are like the highest income of my area...needless to say I am so grateful for that chance that I had to go there because I feel so thankful for the mission experience that I have thus far had and I LOVE that I have had the chance to serve with some of the most humble people in all of our mission. For dinner a member family(they are actually from Twin Falls and that was pretty cool) took us to the Cheesecake Factory. Yeah I have not eaten somewhere like that since before my mission. It was nice but highly over rated. Why spend so much money on food that is so bland?! I needed some more spice to my food...man it's like Americans have no taste buds(no offense if you are American, ja ja!)! I would prefer a plate of beans, rice and carne asada with some corn tortillas on the side any day. The women in the wards that I have served in know how to cook, seeing as how a good amount of them are Latinas(and so am I now!...just a very freckly one... :D). Anyway. I love authentic Latin food. LOVE IT.
So I am realizing something extremely important on my mission. The thing that I should be the most afraid of in my entire life is sin. Honestly on my mission I am not super tempted to commit a whole lot of big sins or anything. One thing that sometimes I do have an issue with is lack of...well I guess that you could call it oomf. Like the "I am so excited that I could pee my pants because I am a missionary and I want to convert the whole world" type of feeling. Some days I feel a lot more excited than others but I am realizing that the biggest fights that I am going to fight in my life are doing things even when I really don't want to do them. The world teaches us that if we don't want to do something then we don't have to do it and that it is our "right" not to have to do anything that we don't want to do. My area is completely jam-packed with these kinds of people. We see parents all of the time never making their children do things that the kids don't want to do...but how are these kids turning out? Kansas City has some of the highest crime, drug use, and gang activity in the entire country not to mention the insane amount of people living off of the government on some type of disability. I have compassion for people with disabilities, believe me I do, but when I say that the majority of the people that we come in contact with in the projects are on disability I am not even exaggerating. So. Getting back to my original thought. What would happen if I did things because Heavenly Father asks me and because really in my heart I have given EVERYTHING I have over to him, knowing and trusting that He knows the beginning from the end and what is best for me? From my personal and companionship studies recently I know that the Lord is asking me for my whole heart. Well I am about ten months into my mission, you would think that I would have gotten this down by now but the honest truth is that I have not. I find myself thinking about how tired I am, or how hungry or how stressed. I find myself thinking about the "outside world" sometimes and things from home, especially my family. You know all of this makes the work harder, not easier. I am realizing that one small choice at a time can help me give myself over more and more to the Lord. I am still human and sometimes I get scared that if I give myself over too much to the Lord that I am going to be a real weirdo after the mission and it will be even harder to give up this name tag and the work that has become who I am and I love who I am...well today I realized that this is going to happen anyway so I just need to let it go and trust that the Lord will provide. Sometimes I am afraid of my own potential because I feel like if I reach that high that no one around me is going to be able to relate with me because a lot of people I have found(on the mission and otherwise) can settle for a different level of commitment and hard work and feel fine about it. Well I think that part of my problem lately with focusing has been that I have not been trying to work my hardest and give all that I have. Jesus Christ says in 3 Nephi 12:6 " And blessed are all they who do hunger and thirst after righteousness, for they shall be filled with the Holy Ghost." So if I put my whole heart into the work, all of my thoughts, my wants, my desires I know that I will "hunger and thirst after righteousness" and then I will be "filled with the Holy Ghost". As missionaries we CANNOT teach with out the Holy Ghost. This is it. I don't want to just feel the Holy Ghost, I want to be "filled" with the Holy Ghost. If I give my whole self, then every night I can lay down knowing that I was filled with the Holy Ghost and that I did not use my frail, mortal words to try to convey the most beautiful message that ever existed. A message of truth such as this needs to be taught by divine power so that the divinity with in all of those that I am teaching will be able to recognize it. So the key to this? Let go. Give it over. I am too weak. I need to give Him my wants, my dreams, my desire, and especially my thoughts and actions. So that is what I need to do. What do you need to do? How can you purify yourself before the Lord? How can you further receive His image in your countenance?
So. A quick reference to the pictures I am sending. One of them is of a member of our ward who is very proud that he can fit a whole soda can in his mouth, his name is Benjamin. Ha ha! Then the others our with some of the lovely sisters that I serve around including my companion.
An update on the mail situation, it has been resolved and my prayers have been answered! The senior sister missionary at the office sent all of the mail from the week before my birthday to an address that does not exist so if you sent me a letter and got it back you can send it to me again with the mission office's address and I should get it because she changed the address to our address. Thank you all for the love and support that you give me, especially letters because it really helps a lot.
Les quero mucho!
con amor,
Hermana Thorne
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