Monday, May 27, 2013
Sunday, May 26, 2013
“The missionary opportunity of a lifetime is yours."
President Thomas S. Monson, has said of those called to serve: “The missionary opportunity of a lifetime is yours. The blessings of eternity await you. Yours is the privilege to be not spectators but participants on the stage of priesthood service.”
Saturday, May 18, 2013
The missionary work here in Mikkeli is going crazy!
Hello everybody!
This week I can only write but a few words
despite the fullness of my heart. We will be spending a few days in Helsinki
next week and are missing our P-day. I have my Language School and Vanhin
Jefferies gets to go to the temple!
The missionary work here in Mikkeli is going
crazy! We currently have 3 people preparing to be baptized in June and another
one that is ready now but just needs more time! I love being a missionary. It
really is the best thing in the world. They said there is a saying something
like, "if you’re not having fun, then you are doing something wrong."
I don’t believe it.
There are some parts of missionary work that
are truly not fun. However, in the end of it all and when you kick your shoes
off as you enter the apartment and reflect on what you just did, nothing is
better than that. Were in the business of saving souls here!
Skyping on Mother's Day was awesome. I may or
may not have cried a little bit after.
Dad: I'm glad you sent me the letter even if it
was a little late. Sad to hear about the tree and the little projector sounds
sick!
Family: you guys are the best. You are all the
kind of people that make me want to miss home. But I don’t because the church
is true! That didn’t really make sense. I love you all! Also I told mom about a
big surprise that I am currently working on sending home. I will give a sneak
peak... It includes... Wait for it... CHOCOLATE!!!! But there is more and you
will just have to wait and find out what it is!
After Skype on Sunday the Sohkonen family fed
us a dessert and sang us happy birthday. They gave us leather Moose shaped
bookmarks and Nestori gave us some chocolate. Then we had a testimony meeting
with Nestori and the Sohkonen family. Nestori even bore his testimony! It was
truly one of the greatest days of my entire life.
I love you all and apologize for if I am forgot
something. I will do my best to reply to everything next time!
Love,
Vanhin Tippetts
Monday, May 13, 2013
Missionary work is a piece of cake!
Hello everybody. The church is true.
Yesterday could very easily been the greatest
day of my life. We got to Skype our families then the Sohkonen family gave us
birthday presents, which were leather moose shaped bookmarks! They are sweet!
Also, our investigator who was there last night, which I can’t, use his name on
the email! He gave us each a bar of Fazer Chocolate! Then we had a
testimony meeting with our investigator and the Sohkonen family. It was a super
special experience that was promptly recorded in my journal immediately after!
A few cool things that happened this week. One
of the priests asked my companion if he would bless the sacrament and he said,
"actually Vanhin Tippetts can!" I, with a frightened stride, made my
way to the stand where I courageously read the sacrament prayer in Finnish! It
was a great experience. Then my companion was a translator for this new Indian
family that moved into our ward. He’s a stud! Also a ward member gave us a cake
for our birthdays. That is really nice but they didn’t really realize that our
only mode of transportation is a bike. So, we strapped it to the back and went
for it!
I hope everyone back home knows that I love you
and pray for you all the time. Aunt Judee, Extended family, meadows ward etc...
The church is true. never be afraid to share it with anyone because if you take
one step the Lord will carry you the rest of the way! He will give you what to
say and will help touch the persons heart no matter what. This message we all
have obligates us to share it. It’s true, so lets start now.
Vanhin Tippetts
Sunday, May 12, 2013
Monday, May 6, 2013
We are so busy here it's hard to comprehend!
Alright here we go! We are so busy here it's hard to comprehend!
So, The church is true and it is even more true here in Mikkeli! We are preparing our Investigator for baptism this next week and we are stoked because next time we have a planning session will be planning a baptism! The members here have been extremely helpful in preparing all our investigators here. We currently have an investigator that a family referred to us and is helping us teach them. She is amazing. We have a lesson tonight with her and we will need all the power we can get!
So we are in sacrament my first Sunday and its time for the breaking of the bread. I start hearing snapping noises and i thought maybe the bread was very stale or something. When the tray got to me I reached out my hand and grabbed what appeared to be a small broken piece of a puffed rice cake! I though it was super weird but maybe someone just forgot to bring the normal bread so they found some rice cakes laying around and decided to use those! Well every Sunday since then they have used puffed rice cakes! Its super cool, and much more filling on fast Sundays! ;)
There is this holiday called Vapu and missionaries are not allowed to go outside unless we have an appointment because a lot of people are drunk! It’s kinda like there Fourth of July. So we stayed in and decided to do our weekly planning session. After that we deep cleaned the apartment. I got the bathroom. (btw we are the only missionaries in Mikkeli) The bathroom consists of a small washing machine, a sink, a toilet and a shower. All within a good 5 sq. feet. The only thing separating the shower from the rest of the bathroom is a curtain. The shower sprays right onto the floor and there is a drain in the middle of the room! Dad, the scold protector is built onto the shower fixture so if you want it hotter you can just turn it off but you have to be careful because its real hot! I love it though. We also took some time to purchase a rug, which is green. We found a small refrigerator underneath the kitchen table and decided to take it out onto our balcony or parveque and use it as our planning break area!
So vapu was fun. We are planning on skyping from our branch mission leaders house on Sunday. His name is Jarkko. Remind me to tell you a funny story about him!
So, we are primarily on bikes so my legs are getting sufficiently toned. To work on my upper body i have set a goal to do 100 pushups everyday! its going well! We also eat this stuff that’s supposed to be healthy, its called Rakka. I’m not exactly sure what it is though...
i found out that Elder Jefferies and I are related through John Tippetts.
I got my first leadership assignment this week. They have asked me to serve as assistant to the president... Just kidding, I am the district chef so i choose what we will eat for district meeting and then make assignments for who brings what! This week is breakfast burritos and the meeting is in kouvola.
I have listed some not so serious items but i hope it illustrates how we try to have fun while we work.
A fun story we had. Last night we just short of a few goals. We went outside and prayed to have help with accomplishing our goals. We then went to this place we had previously designed to go and began to knock on every door there! We knocked on this door and the person that opened the door was more than willing to listen to us and set up an appointment for next week. The amazing thing is that the goals we set as missionaries are merely numbers to motivate us to achieve more. To reach out to those who know not God. When we set goals it increases our vision and with increased vision comes increased motivation.
Conference quote: We were not called to serve because of our amazing talents or because of the achievements we have done but because the Lord has work to be done. There has never been a better time than right now to work as hard as we can to help this marvelous work move forward. Get with the missionaries, feed them dinner and find friends who would want to hear the gospel. We as missionaries can only do so much.
Remember who you are, your are all children of a heavenly king which makes you heirs to his kingdom. Therefore, we all have an obligation to share the gospel with them.
The church is true everyone!
Love,
Vanhin Tippetts
PS. I did get the package and it was awesome. I can’t wait for my birthday package!
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