Week 71: "I want Jesus!" - Jaden

Hello loving family and friends! This week flew by sooooo fast. Not

fair! Anyway, lots of miraculous things happened - the Lord really

made things happen cuz we had tons of meetings and not a lot of times,

but he sure consecrated the time we did have.

Happy Birthday Sister Seigfried!!

Thanks Mom and family for sending me all those cute notes from

reunion! I love them!

Shout out to my sibs: I would love a letter from each of you before my

mission ends. If that's possible, I would really love that! Thanks!

So the greatest miracle I want to share is the miracle of Kalimah! I

think I told you about her last week: a member brought her to general

conference on Sunday and this week's he has progressed so much!!!

She's getting baptized on the 24th and she's owning it!! She told so

many people at church yesterday about her baptism and she participated

in the classes like a member. She is so excited to be baptized and I

love her! She has a 3 year old son named Jaden and yesterday when we

were teaching her the restoration, the Spirit was super strong and her

son, who is a little crazy whispered "I want Jesus!" And we just

looked at him like..... What? :) just a few minutes prior I tried

distracting him by showing him pictures of Christ and I whispered just

the simple truths: that He knows him and loves him so much. Then a few

minutes after hearing those truths he said that - it was a tender

experience and brought Kalimah to tears. She has had soooo many

spiritual confirmations and it has been such a blessing to be there

with her during those confirmations. She says some pretty cool things

sometimes that really just hit us how prepared she totally is. It is

truly amazing!!

I love you all so much!! Have an amazing week!!

Con todo mi corazón y mi amor,

Hermana Shumway

MLC

Exchanges with the Pratt Sisters!! Sister Peterson and
Sister Tafua!! #prattskillinit

Weel 68: "Now....jump into my arms!!"

Hellooooooo from Kansas!!!!!

So this week was good as they all are as a missionary :) and all of
them forever after will be because missions don't end and we can
always be disciples of Christ!

For some reason a TON of people we met and taught this week got
anti-ed, meaning they "researched" the Church, found information they
didn't understand fully, then told us they didn't want us to come
back, EVEN THOUGH after we taught them the Restoration and had a
spiritual experience with them we TOLD them that Satan doesn't want
them to find the truth or have everlasting life or even just be happy
and will do all he can to turn them away from Christ's gospel by
putting doubts in their head through their "research" or friends
or....whatever and to make sure they ASK US if they have questions or
concerns and we can help them understand. None of them did that
though. :( a decision that will determine their destiny... So that was
way sad. But that just means there are lots more other people who can
and want to be baptized!!

This week we got new missionaries!!!! So Sister Bringhurst and I got
to take out a couple Sisters and get to WORK for a few hours!! The
goal was to help them invite someone to be baptized!! I was with
Sister Samani and it was so fun! I loved just getting to knock doors
and talk to everyone :)) I loved seeing all the miracles with a new
Sister and helping her have an awesome first day! It caused me to
reflect on my first day in Kansas....inviting someone to be baptized
and read the Book of Mormon at a gas station :) I still remember how
willing he was to follow Christ! Gas station contacting...always good
cuz the people can't go anywhere! Haha

A lot of the part member families we are working with... Don't get how
super important the Gospel is to live RIGHT NOW. So we had a couple
lessons with the member part of the part member families testifying
HARD CORE how time is running out and now is the time and day of their
salvation. I hope they felt the Spirit so we can teach their families
and help them progress.

Yesterday, we found another LOST SHEEP!!!! It was awesome! We met her
a few weeks ago and thought she was a potential investigator, but then
when we went to follow up with her yesterday, we were teaching her
about the story of the Book of Mormon and when Jesus Christ came and
taught the people in the Americas and she was super excited to read
it! Then I told her how baptism is so important to Jesus Christ, that
was the first thing he taught to the people here - ya know warming up
to the challenge for baptism - and she all of a sudden told us she was
baptized in the LDS church when she was 14!!!! We were like WHAT!?!
And she wants us to teach her kids!!! It was great :) I love it!

Anyway....missionary life is the best and I love it. And I love you.
And I love Jesus Christ.
The end!

Con todo mi corazón y mi amor,

Hermana Shumway


P.S. Happy Anniversary to Aaron and Alicia!! Love you guys!!

Sister Samani and I!!

Ward camp-out fun!! I love these people!!

#nofilter

Week 70: We Thank Thee, Oh God, for a Prophet!!

What's up from Wichita!!!

 I forgot to say thank you to Mom for sending me a post card last
 week!! I love that you're doing that :)

This week was super great! With lots of great things with of course
some disappointing things. But the BEST thing was watching General
Conference and feeling the reality of the perfection of Jesus Christ's
Church on the Earth. Can you deny the confirming witness from the
Spirit that those men are called of God? Nope! I have never been more
excited to read and reread the talks!!

So on exchanges this week I was riding another Sister's bike and it
got STOLEN!! Yeah. That was a sad realization when we got out of the
appointment! Haha very interesting. No one wanted to hear from a girl
on a bike....that's fine. You'll just hear it on foot ;) haha

Talking about general conference and a living Prophet on the Earth
today definitely softened some hearts this week!! Especially with one
of our investigators named Marlo. When we first met her she
immediately told us she wasn't interested. We were in her neighborhood
again this past week when she just happened to step outside her home!
We followed up with the past commitment we extended and started
telling her about general conference!! She immediately opened up and
told us her life story of spiritual experiences and accepted a Book of
Mormon and wanted to learn more!!! She did watch some of conference
this weekend and we are excited to talk to her more!!

Super funny thing happened this week!! We went to dinner at a member's
elderly home apartment place and she paraded us all around the
cafeteria place introducing us to everyone and all her friends and
they were asking us all these questions about what we do and one of
them, Sue, came over to our table later and asked if we would come and
meet with her and answer some of her questions!! Who woulda thought!?
It was funny :) she read the Book of Mormon when she was 17!! I just
wanted to record our whole time there...it was pretty funny :)

Another miracle!! Before conference on Sunday we were feeling a little
discouraged with the lack of people desiring to progress and be
baptized. We said a prayer when we left the apartment just PLEADING
with the Lord to help us find the people who are prepared. We went and
saw someone we met the night before, and she had been reading in the
Book of Mormon and wants to know more and be baptized!!! It was
awesome. Total miracle and answer to prayer. That was really watered
down, but I promise it was such a tender mercy.

I love everything about this, with all the bitter and the sweet. :)

 Con todo mi amor y mi corazón,

Hermana Shumway

Oh snap!!! Another miracle! A member brought a friend to conference
and she LOVED IT!!! She felt the spirit strongly and knows those men
are called of God. Tender mercies all around even when things are
looking bleak. Faith in Jesus Christ is really all we need to take
part in the Lord's miracles. :) I love Him!

Zone conference.

Mom - isn't this awesome?!

We wrote a song last week! It's super good and everyone loves
it!! I'll send it soon.

Week 69: "He was kind of depressed.....so we taught him the Law of Chastity."

A missionary classic. Oh we laughed so hard!!! Hahahaha the Elders
said it was exactly what their investigator needed though!

Sooo this week in Kansas was awesome! We had zone conference on
Wednesday where I had to give my departing testimony cuuuuuz the next
zone conference is after I go home! So that was dumb! But good, I'm
sure it would have been way worse if I actually do go home soon. But
zone conference was sure awesome. I love learning from President Bell.
He is such an inspired man and I look up to him so much! He always
focuses on the Atonement and building faith in Christ. He is
definitely helping me lay a great foundation for life. My favorite
part of zone conference was when President and Sister Bell let us as
them questions about marriage and family. They set up a cute little
living room complete with a rug and a fake fireplace! (They are so
cute!) That was very insightful!

A really awesome thing we started doing this week is practicing
teaching on the members! So this is how it works. We go to their home,
they choose who they want to pretend to be (non members), pick their
situation (first visit or follow up visit) and then we teach them like
we would teach their friends!! It was miraculous and super edifying
for all!! It was so much easier to teach in a home where the Holy
Ghost already is!!! It was awesome for the members because afterwards
they felt so much more motivation to share the gospel with the people
they were acting as. We are going to keep doing it!!! One of the
members is actually setting up a dinner and lesson in their home with
us and their friends! Keep you posted on that!

Hey! Conference is this weekend!!!! 3 new apostles! It's going to be
crazy cool. We have an investigator named Cashley who is preparing to
be baptized on October 24th (he has been taught forever and finally
made a solid commitment to ACT!!!) told us that one thing he does not
like is that he has been in church for his whole life and he never
knew there was a prophet on the earth today until he came to the LDS
church. He was very upset about that! He thinks we should be talking
about that all the time! The whole world needs to know what a prophet
of God is saying!! So....because of Cashley, and for the sake of
others who feel as he does, invite a friend to listen to God's
ordained servants by watching General Conference this weekend! Do it
out of love and offer some food and they can't say no! Just kidding.
:) really. We all need to know how to prepare for the Second Coming of
Jesus Christ.

MIRACLES. Tons happened this week. One that stands out to me today is
Bertha! We taught Bertha the restoration on the doorstep and gave her
a Book of Mormon and invited her to read it and be baptized. We didn't
follow up for a long time because we wrote down her phone number
wrong! Finally we saw her again and she had read some and felt the
Spirit. Right then we invited her again to be baptized on a specific
date. She accepted and we told her what to do to prepare. She is
already living the commandments!!! We then invited her to pray about
the date specifically. She did and she said she felt joy and peace!!
It was a miracle! We love her and are excited to help her! And Cashley
(as mentioned above) accepted to be baptized next month too! He is
really expecting and looking forward to feeling the fire of the Holy
Ghost :) he knows his stuff!

Well family and friends. I love you and I love Kansas. And Oklahoma :) haha
I love being a missionary. This week I learned through exchanges with
Sister Furner that we don't really want to be confident....would you
describe the Savior as being confident? Yeah..that made us ponder a
lot. Our confidence should come from knowing who we are as Daughters
of God and knowing that because of that divine nature, our potential
is....limitless! Our confidence lies in knowing who we are and knowing
who Christ is. During Christ's 40 day fast, Satan's attacks were to
persuade Christ to deny His own divine nature. "If you are the Son of
God..." and he will try to get us to do the same. There is SO much
power in just knowing who we are.
Heavenly Father loves us.
Come listen to a prophet's voice this weekend :) and tell everyone
else to do so as well!!!

I lalalalalalovvvve you!!!

Con todo mi corazón y mi amor,

Hermana Shumway

Posterity pic!! Sister Rosell is training.

Went to McDonald's.....she ordered an oreo mcflurry....got
a frappe instead.....yeah. That's a bummer. Can't even give
it away!

I love Sister Furner!!!

Exchange lunch with the Newton Sisters!

Week 67: Faith and Patience......a little more inseparable than I thought

Exchanges in Newton!!!

Oh!!!!! Sarah and Stephen I am so sorry I forgot to wish you a happy birthday last week :( but happy birthday!!! I hope you had a great day!

SISTER MENDOZA IS AN STL!!!!!!!! :D!!!! Oh my heck she is such a good missionary and will help the other Sisters SOOOO much. I love her. 

Shoutout to Sister Dani Shumway and Sister Noheli Trejo who entered the MTC this week! Being a missionary is the best thing in the world. Such a privilege and a blessing. Your time is short, cherish it now and savor every moment as a representative of Christ. I LOVE YOU!!!

This week I pondered a lot about my relationship with Jesus Christ and my true motives for doing missionary work, why do I do what I do? I have been feeling a little separation from Him lately but I found so much comfort in the scriptures. Especially in 3 Nephi 22:7-8. Read it, it's AWESOME. I also read a talk called Lessons from Liberty Jail and was able to talk to Sister Furner (pictured above) a TON about the Atonement. I have been striving to use the Atonement to turn my good into better and become who the Lord needs me to be for the rest of my life. I pray I am changing to fulfill His plan! I feel like I am learning so much and experiencing so much and I love it!!!

Good news!!! Transfers are this week and I'm staying in Bel Aire with Sister Bringhurst!! We are really striving to strengthen each other's weaknesses. It's interesting because I see what she thinks are her weaknesses as strengths because they are qualities that I don't have them! Haha I know it's hard to understand, but we are going to be focusing on that a lot this transfer. 

The Lord showed us so many of His tender mercies this week. I learned that we can have so much faith in Jesus Christ and His power and His Atonement, but if we don't have the faith to be patient and trust in God's timing...we'll get real discouraged reeeeeal quick and then it's like we never had faith in the first place! 

Well, I love you so much and am grateful for your love and prayers!!!

Con todo mi amor y mi corazón,

Hermana Shumway

Bowling! Always quite the adventure, but SO worth it!!

An accidental dinner appointment. A
Cambodian soup with lots of seafood I'd
never heard of before......good thing I'm
adventurous with food!! And the thing
on the right is the dessert. It had sticky
rice on the outside and coconut on the
inside!!

Week 66: "Elders and Sisters, you are all STARS!!"

This week we spent a lot of time with part-member families. That is a
pretty self-explanatory term but it means that only part of the family
are members of the church!! We are excited to continue working with
them to help them progress towards the temple and eternal families!!
This week's goal is to introduce them to active members and get them
some solid fellowship to help them come back to reactivity!

This week was really enlightening. On Tuesday I had an awwwwesome
personal study that taught me soooo much about the character of Jesus
Christ. Elder Riddle, our district leader, invited us all to read John
15 for district meeting so I read that and I just happened to be in 3
Nephi 17 in my personal Book of Mormon study. It was incredible to
read them both together and I invite you all to do the same this
week!! I came to understand so much clearer the love and compassion of
Christ and how much He LOVES us and how He shows that love. I have
felt this week that my testimony of the Gospel of Jesus Christ is
turning into conversion and it is truly what Lehi describes!!! Fruit
that exceeds everything in sweetness and brightness. I learned from
John 15 that we HAVE to be firmly attached to the Savior. He is the
vine, we are the branches and we cannot produce any fruit of
ourselves. Without Him we can do nothing and we will wither and die.
How can we possibly think sometimes that we don't need Him? Or His
gospel? How can we think we can survive without being firmly rooted in
Him? I know as we draw unto Him, He draws nearer unto us and we can
truly fulfill His plan.

We had Mission Leadership Council this week which is always fun :)
here's some pics of that!! The Leadership Council consists of
President and Sister Bell of course, the Assistants to the President,
then all the Zone Leaders and Sister Training Leaders throughout the
mission! It is so fun and inspiring to be surrounded with the greatest
missionary minds once a month!!! Especially with some of my closest
friends :)

An awesome miracle from this week is that a man named Rey that I met while on exchanges with another Sister came to church now the Elders are teaching him!!!

Family and friends, I know Jesus Christ is our Redeemer. I know with more and more certainty each day that this IS His Gospel and His truth. He has restored all we need to receive eternal life. We cannot delay. There is no time to waste, there is no time to wait. That is Satan's plan! Time is running out! Let us be anxiously engaged. Let us do all we can to declare love and repentance to everyone around us, every minute of every day. There is no other way, but through Christ. Be saviors on Mount Zion!!! 

I LOVE YOU ALL!!!!!

Con todo mi corazón y mi amor,

Hermana Shumway

Labor Day breakfast with Sister Smith!

Mission Leadership Council.

Earlier in this day we saw a man whose shirt said "You can't
block my shine" so we ran with it. Haha

Week 65: "Leon??" "WHAT?!!?!?!?!"

Hi, this is Sister Bringhurst's letter cuuuuuz I'm out of time!! I love you!!
HAPPY BIRTHDAY SISTER ROSELL!!!!!! I lalalalalalalovvvvve you!!!

The subject this week comes from the best dinner appointment I have
had on my mission. An older couple fed us and the elders and I just
can't explain how funny it was. I wish I recorded it.

Also, met a girl named Ariana. You think that's how you spell it?
Think again. She spells it Aureiyona. Adding that to my list of kids
names! Along with Chatauqua. Did I ever tell you about that? Probably
not... #sorry

This week was... Enlightening? Yeah. Learned a TON and I finally feel
like I turned everything over to the Savior. Took me long enough..

But really, I just decided after stake conference this weekend that I
just needed to have faith. That things WILL work because it's HIS
work, not because of anything I would do.

(Me) We learned this week that really. All you need is faith. There's
a reason it's the first principle of the gospel. We are working on
ditching the doubts and forgetting faithless phrases :) you like that?
Haha since we have been working on using the Atonement to change our
mindset, we have seen MIRACLES. The Lord has been able to do so much
more for us because we believe He will! It has been awesome to see and
expect everything to happen as the Lord promises it will.
We have found solid people to teach and the Lord is answering our prayers.

We're working with an awesome investigator named Heather! She is going
to school at WSU and is really searching for what's missing in her
life. She's doing really awesome and definitely needs prayers! She is preparing to be baptized on September 19th.

Also we had a super cool experience last night. We went to help and
talk to some people moving outside last night and one of them, Holly,
saw our name tags and like immediately started asking tons of
questions. She and her sister have gone through a lot recently. The
biggest thing was their mom passed away a few years ago and they also
lost their dad about a month ago. It was amazing to talk about the
plan of salvation and also clear up the weird things they had heard
about Mormons :) love that haha. It definitely made me realize how
incredibly grateful I am for the knowledge we have of the plan for us
and how much peace I feel about what happens after this life. We're
super excited to meet with them again and share more of the gospel
with them!

I love being a missionary!! And I love my Savior and am so grateful
for the relationship I've been able to build and strengthen with Him
this last year. The time is going by way too fast and I know I don't
have any more to waste. I hope you all are doing well! Have the best
week!

😺😺😺
Sister Bringhurst

(Me) Turn to the Savior. That's what I learned this week. Stop turning
towards myself and look to Him and live. Probably the most eternal
thing I could ever learn. Oh man, gotta love my mission :) gotta love
Kansas.

Annnnnd

Con todo mi corazón y mi amor,

Hermana Shumway