December 2nd

"Behold, this is my work and my glory; to bring to pass the immortality and eternal life of man." (moses 1:39)
 

I declare with all of my heart that this IS God´s work. Every day of my mission I have seen His hand work in the lives of those around me and every moment of every day I have felt His presence as He presides in the work of spreading abroad His restored gospel.
 

I testify that this is His Church and that He has prefectly established it so that we may be prepared to receive eternal life and that He may be glorified.
 

I know He loves us each perfectly and that He gave His life to repair all of our flaws and failings. I know that He hears your prayers. Always.
 

I know He lives. It has been an honor to wear His name over my heart as I have served a mission for Him.
 

"Look unto me in every thought; doubt not, fear not. Behold the wounds which pierced my side and the prints of the nail in my hands and feet. Be faithful, keep my commandments, and ye shall inherent the kingdom of heaven. Amen." (D&C 6:36.37)
 

Love,

Hermana Anderson
https://drive.google.com/open?id=0ByRUZeow-VaVa0EyZld6QUlZTUE

November 25th

Heres the weekly update

Gendraily got baptized on Saturday! But let me tell you about the horrific ordeal that went down behind the scenes.....

...It was Saturday morning when my companion and I went to clean and fill the font for Gendraily´s baptism. As we opened the doors to the font we were shocked to see about 4 inches of water in the font--dirty water. "Stinking Elder´s can´t even drain the font right!" I thought to myself. The stench of the dirty water was a little hard to bear, but we got to work trying to unstop the drain nonetheless. Despite our best efforts, the water remained. I called the Elders and explained the situation and one told me, "Oh yeah this is the worst font ever, the drain hardly works. Last time my companion and I used the plunger to get the water down. Try that. We´ll be there to help in a minute." Whelp. My companion and I got the plunger and as she was plunging awañy at the drain she started to shreek, "Compa! Compa! What IS that?!" I looked at the drain to see that dark, cloudy filth was seeping up from the drain, turning the dirty water even dirtier. As the water became darker and darker the stench grew stronger and stronger. We could no longer bear it. Retreat! Retreat! We figured that we had unclogged whatever was in the drain and decided to wait a few minutes--far from the font and the foul smell--to see if the water would go down. The Elders showed up and when we went to examine the font it looked the same. The valiant elders got into the water with buckets and begain to bail all the dirty  water out for us. When there was just a teensy bit of water and filth left, a member suddenly showed up. As she examined the scene before her with her eyes and witnessed the stench with her nose, she pieced together what had somehow managed to escape four foreigners. "Elders!" she shouted. "Get out of the font! That is POOP WATER!!!!"  Ahhhhhh!!!! The poor elders spent a good long while washing their legs off with some bleach in the bathroom sinks. But wait. There´s more. Now that we could see the drain clearly, it became evident that the poopy water continued to surge upward into the font little by little, coming from the RIM of the drain. That meant that even if we could manage to remove all water and filth, disinfect the font, plug the drain, and fill it with clean water that little by little poopy water would seep in and contaminate it all over again! And you just can´t baptize somebody in poopy water--it defeats the whole symbol of baptism!

The miracle was that we were able to hold the baptism in another chapel and it all came together quite nicely :) Gendraily is such a rockstar.

My ponderizing scripture this week is about cheerfully doing all in your power and that´s my goal for the next few days (let´s not count, okay?). DO ALL I CAN!

Love you all. Happy Thanksgiving. Have a great week!

Hermana Anderson
https://drive.google.com/open?id=0ByRUZeow-VaVanFfdS11QW9yODA 
 
 

November 18th

We have a baptism this Saturday! Gendrailyn is 13 and is soooo prepared for the gospel. We are very excited for Saturday. in other news, we are teaching lots and lots of families with loads of potential. I feel so happy that I will be able ot leave La Vega in a good condition for the next missionary, even though I won´t get to stay to see all the progress of these people :( I really feel as though my heart belongs in this country and with these people. Can´t I just split myself in two and let one half of me stay here forever?

I love you all and I love learning to love more. That is the most important thing I am learning right now: how to develop the love of the Savior and how WONDERFUL it is.

My scripture for ponderizing this week is D&C 97;8 which talks about how we need to have honest and broken hearts, contrite spirits, and be willing to make ANY sacrifice the Lord would require of us to be accepted of Him. This verse helps me understand how I can gauge (I can´t remember English words anymore) if I am humble enough before the Lord. For example, if I feel that something is too big a sacrifice and it is hard for me to make that sacrifice for God, then I know that something needs to change in me and I need to break my heart a bit more and make my spirit more contrite. I know that it is thrugh our sacrificies that the Lord gives us our greatest blessings.

Have a great week. I love you all!

Hermana Anderson

https://drive.google.com/open?id=0ByRUZeow-VaVRGhsQy1CZXZxclk
 

November 11th

I can no longer count months left in the mission; I count weeks.

I feel a certain need to be profound since these will be some of the last messages written as Hermana Anderson. To be completely honest, I feel an incredible amount of pressure to make everything I do profound and meaningful right now. I think I finally understand what people mean when they say, "live like you're dying." I want all of you to know that I am safe and sound and that I absolutely love what I am doing. Most of all I want you to know that God lives and that I see miracles at His hands EVERY DAY. Oh, it is wonderful, wonderful to me! 

One very interesting thought from this week: throughout all time there have been several prophecies and promises made. The first and biggest was that Christ would be our Savior and atone for our sins. Second, there would be an apostasy. Third, a restoration would be brought about. 4th, Israel will be gathered. Last of all, Christ will come again to reign on earth. Do you realize that we are in phase four? Here{s another thought to top it off: who is in charge of phase four? The 12 apostles are special witnesses of Christ, and it is their duty to spread abroad the gospel and direct the gathering of Israel--but they have chosen to use full-time missionaries to help them accomplish this great work and fill their responsibility. It is such an honor to be a missionary!

I love this work and I love you all!

Hermana Anderson

https://drive.google.com/open?id=0ByRUZeow-VaVMzNsaGlLUmVpVHM

November 11th

I can't believe that I am down to WEEKS left in this incredible time of my life. I love and miss all of you.