Oranje!

I'll be honest, this was a strange week. I was gone for two days on exchanges and then got back and we were in the middle of figuring everything out for our booth in the centrum on King's Day. Then there was King's Day, which was crazy but great! I'll talk more about it later.

First of all, Fa. was sick this week. Heel jammer! She cancelled our appointments... But we should be able to see her this week! We saw her on Koningsdag and she was looking quite a bit better. We'll have to reset her baptismal date because she still hasn't come to church, but as far as we can tell she's still excited. :)

Jy's still incredibly difficult to get ahold of. We need to have a serious talk with him and let him know that if he wants this, he needs to make time for it!

Hd. is a miracle. All the time. He was sick and couldn't make it to church yesterday, but we had some amazing lessons with him this last week. On Tuesday Sister Brown and Sister Rosenlof taught him the Plan of Salvation, then on Friday we taught him the Gospel of Jesus Christ! We invited him to prepare to be baptized on the 14th of June. He accepted and we promised him that he can absolutely be ready for that day. What a cool man. He came to visit us at our booth on Koningsdag, which was fun!

Not a ton to say as far as other people go. We've been contacting referrals up a storm, with a few fairly positive ones in the mix. We have a couple appointments scheduled with them for this week! We also gave Ja. her Afrikaans Book of Mormon and should hopefully be able to meet with her this week.

 

Quick rundown on Koningsdag - We woke up at 4:30, got ready, headed to the centrum, and set up our table around 6 or 6:30... We were almost the only ones there until like 9ish. Haha. But it was cool! We gave out lots of copies of the Book of Mormon, Finding Faith in Christ (DVD), pamphlets, and mormon.org cards. It was awesome! (Kings day is to celebrate the King's coronation, everyone dresses in orange, a big celebration all over the country.)

I am SO excited to attend the temple this week. I've been feeling a little bit anxious of late, as far as my relations (or lack thereof) with some of the ward and some of the investigators go, so I'm excited to be able to ponder that in the temple and see if I can come up with a plan with the Lord's help. I'm also excited to see Keukenhof! I hear the tulips are still very much in bloom!

 

Also, family members came to church yesterday! We were announcing some missionary things in Relief Society and a couple of sisters visiting from Utah were in the front row. After we were done, one said, "What's that sister's last name?" And upon seeing it, she said "Hey! We're your family!" Turns out they're Copiers - Opa Anjewierden's cousins Janie, Louise, and Annette, with their sweet friend Ellen! Today we went with them to have breakfast and see the house in Breukelen where great-grandma Anjewierden grew up. They're wonderful ladies and we had a lot of fun with them. :)

 

Well... I honestly don't know what else to say. I'm a little unmotivated today, I think I'm still pretty tired from Saturday, haha. But.... Yep!

 

Love you all! Have a marvelous week!

 

Zuster Anjewierden

Our booth for King's day!

My awesome orange hat to celebrate the day!

Cousins, at church and in front of great-grandma's house in Breukelen(Brooklyn)!

Easter!!!

This might be a quick one due to some miscommunication between us and the elders about who was emailing at the church, but I'm going to do my best to say all that I want to say! We had a great week and there really is tons to say!

First of all, Fa. has a new lawyer now and has been told that she should know about her status in about a month. This lawyer is super optimistic about her situation and thinks they have found something that will help her case. So that's good news! Also good news is that we shared the Plan of Salvation with her and she LOVED it. We came back the next time and asked if she had read the pamphlet about it and she said "Yes, I did! I loved it! It was so cool!" So, naturally, we loved that. She also loved learning about the Gospel of Jesus Christ, and is looking forward to her baptism.

Jy. is MIA this week. He has no credit on his pay-as-you-go phone, so he can't call us, and everytime we've called, he hasn't picked up. We're hoping that he's just been working when we've called him. We're going to do our best to get in contact with him this week. We're praying for it!

A couple of super cool new investigators this week. The first is Ja., who Sister Djoukeng and I found on exchanges on Wednesday. She's from South Africa. We had a great first lesson with her this past Friday where she accepted a baptismal commitment with, "Yes, of course." We'll be seeing her again in a couple of days!

The other is Hd., who is just a miracle all around. On Monday night we'd had a dinner appointment set up with an inactive member. We called to confirm it and she had forgotten it was supposed to be that night. Well, we had a couple back-up plans but nothing super great, so we visited Fa. with some cookies and then headed to look some former investigators up. There was one address that we'd tried to find a few times previously, but with no success. We ended up finding it this time - it was a refugee camp. I'm fairly familiar with refugee camps, as I've taught many refugees in other cities, and one thing I know is that it's never a permanent thing - the odds of this former being there were not super high. We weren't feeling terribly hopeful, but we went inside and asked the man at the front desk if she lived there. He looked her up and said that she didn't, she must have found somewhere to live. We were pretty disappointed, because we'd felt pretty inspired to go there. Well, there was a little middle-eastern man who had been talking to the man at the desk when we walked in, who'd walked outside to take a call. We walked out to our bikes, and he came up to ask if we'd found who we were looking for. Then he asked who we were and what we do. We explained a bit, and he mentioned that he was a Christian. We talked a little bit about the Book of Mormon, and ended up setting up an appointment with him. We left feeling on top of the world - we hadn't been led there for nothing!

We had our appointment with him on Saturday. The Zone Leaders had come to work with us a bit and came with us. We were all completely amazed at this man and what he's been through. After speaking to him about the fruits of the Spirit, we asked if he'd ever felt any of those things. He said yes, last year, and proceeded to tell us his incredible conversion to Christianity. We shared the rest of the first lesson, and the Spirit was incredibly strong as we asked him if he would be baptized when he receives an answer of the truth of our message. He didn't just say yes, he promised us. He said, "Ik beloof jullie. Nee, ik beloof Hem." ( I promise you, No, I promise Him.)  And pointed upwards. He's amazing! He came to church yesterday as well and the ward already seems to love him.

Well... There are other things but that's about all that I felt NEEDED to be said, other than exchanges have been going well! It's been neat so far to work with these sisters that I know and love and to learn from them and hopefully help them a bit. I was able to work in Dordrecht on Tuesday with Sister Thorley, and it was neat to work with a previous companion in a previous city!

Easter was incredible. I read the Easter story in Luke for my personal study and I just loved it. The atonement is real :) In church a high councilman talked about how we should strive every day be worthy of the suffering that Christ went through for us, and I thought that it was a beautiful thought. Then, last night, we had the opportunity to sing in an Easter Concert put together by Igor and Vesna Gruppman. That woman is a saint. She's incredible - I don't know how she did it all. But UGH it was so good. And felt so good to sing again. You all should look up "Gethsemane" by Sally DeFord. It's beautiful. We closed with "This is the Christ" and I got choked up and it was just overall amazing.

I love you all so much! 

Okayyy think that's it. Love you all!

Zuster Anjewierden

Love is what it is all about!

Okay well first off, we've received 3 referrals from the Easter campaign! We're going to go visit them ASAP. I'll talk about them next week.

Fa. had some hard news this week - she found out that her case to stay in Nederland was denied. She's going to try again, with a different lawyer. But... She took it very hard. She didn't come to church on Sunday. We have an appointment with her tomorrow and are praying that her heart will be opened to what the Gospel can do to bring her comfort in this difficult time.

Jy.! Jy. was a former investigator. He's from Ghana and was visiting there for a month and then he came back and we had this AWESOME lesson with him on Saturday! He's so cool. He asked about the gift of tongues, because he grew up pentacostal church and they believe in the gift of tongues as unintelligible mumbling and such, and we talked about how actually the spirit speaks in our language and gave the example of Paul and how he was able to speak to people who he definitely didn't speak the same language as! Or at least not well. So. Then we talked about how it was like us - We bore testimony of how we've seen the gift of tongues in our missions! It was neat. We also asked him why he thinks it's important to be baptized. He said that we're baptized because we believe in Christ, and if we choose not to be baptized, we don't really believe, because Jesus said to be baptized! It was really neat. We set a baptismal date with him for the 24th of May, and we are looking forward to then. :)

I go on my first exchange tomorrow and I'm looking forward to implementing what I learned at District Leader council and Mission Leader Council! I want to do all that I can to help the sisters in this zone be the best that they can, though I'm sure I'll learn tons more from them!

Just a quick spiritual thing - We've been sharing Isaiah 49:15-16 with people and I love it. I love that Jesus loves us so much that He will never forget us. That our "walls are continually before [Him]." I love this gospel of love and I know that it's true - the atonement is love, and that's what it's all about!

I love you all. :) Have a great week! 

Sister Anjewierden

Utrecht kinda sounds like Utah

Well, I once complained about typing on a French keyboard and now I'm struggling on an English one. The irony! :)

After some bittersweet goodbyes with members and investigators in Turnhout, I made it safely back up to the low lands! It is going well thus far. Things are definitely different and I'm a little homesick for Flemish and for Turnhout, but I am excited for the love I know I will develop for Utrecht! The birthplace of my grandfather! So neat. That said, the work is certainly also different here, but I am really excited to work here with Sister Brown. I LOVE Sister Brown, and I have full confidence that we are going to see incredible things this transfer.

We have this incredible new investigator, Fa., who is now on date to be baptized on the 17th of May. She is so cool! She's from Sierra Leone and has seen SO much sorrow in her life, but she's such a trooper. She has the cutest little four-year-old son, Gl. She is really excited to be baptized, and loves to hear about the gospel! She even helped us contact this Bulgarian lady at the bus stop. She told her that the church was beautiful and that "it's only 3 hours long!" Seriously - super neat lady.

Well... Not a ton more to say right now. General conference was incredible, and I loved being able to see a couple of old friends from Dordrecht! Sa. and Brother De. were there! Also Sister D. D. and Ta. and a couple of others. So cool! I won't lie, conference made me a little bit trunky. It's weird to think that the next time I watch it I'll be home...

I loved the themes of Christlike love and defending faith that were throughout all of conference. It was an amazing conference, truly! I'm excited to hear the last session. My favorite talk was probably President Uchtdorf's talk on Gratitude. I want to strive to be better at being grateful IN and not for my circumstances. I think I'll make that a goal this transfer.

New address is:

Dr Max Euwestraat 10

3554 EZ Utrecht

Nederland

Love you so much! Have a great week. :)

Zuster Anjewierden

Me with the amazing Sister Brown at soccer game.  Love her!
Reunited with people from Dordrecht during Conference weekend!
Saying goodbye to Sister Mizell, Elders, and Belgium. Goodbyes are hard!

Overgeplaatst!

Well, the news is in. I'm headed to Utrecht, where I will be serving with Sister Brown. I've been called as a Sister Training Leader. I am feeling SO humbled right now. Missionary work is hard enough when I only have to worry about myself and my companion. I am so often taken aback by how much the Lord trusts me with... I am excited to do my best to help the sisters in the Rotterdam zone though. And I'll have the opportunity to work in Dordrecht on exchanges, as well as with two previous companions - Sister Thorley and Sister Hudson! :)

Words truly can't express how I'm feeling right now. I'm excited and scared and humbled and nervous and really just a little bit of everything. I'm excited for what is coming, but also sad to leave Turnhout. I'm always surprised at how hard transfers can be. Without fail, no matter how much I prepare myself to leave people (members, missionaries, investigators) or to watch them go (missionaries, investigators), it's always harder than I remember. This transfer is no different - I already miss some of the people I'll be leaving here and I haven't even left yet! It's incredible to me that in just a few months, people can make incredibly strong bonds with those around them - I know that there are people I've met in my 6 months here in Turnhout that will be lifelong friends, and likely even people I will see in the hereafter. That's so amazing to me. Much like learning the language, I've learned that there's nothing that brings people together faster than the Spirit, and the Gospel of Jesus Christ. As hard is it is to leave them, I'm so grateful for those connections and friendships! Because of them, Turnhout has become sacred ground for me.

I don't have much time because we need to go get everything ready for me to leave, but here are a few miracles we saw this week.

-Really enjoyed Zone training! I'm now working on Charity and Love.

-Sl. is SO ready to be baptized. Two more weeks! It'll be hard to miss the baptisms we have coming up but I'm SO proud of these people and the progress they're making. :)

-Jb. should be home! We're trying to get in contact with him but he may be sleeping as he came in last night.

-I am amazed at the charity of this incredible branch. They've done SO much to help us this week. Members truly make the difference. They're so willing to come on joint teach, or to give us food, or to do their own missionary work, or serve those around them. I will miss these people. They're incredible!

LOVE YOU SO MUCH

Sister Anjewierden