Week 67 Transfers!!!

 Hello! This week was transfers. I don't know what transfer I am on, but today is my 16 month mark being a missionary.

So.... *drumroll* I stayed in Bennington!! Sister Larsen got transferred to Delhi, which is hilarious because they are our tech specialists, so we talk to them a lot.

I got 2 Companions! Sister Sanders and Sister Godfrey. Sister Sanders was actually my sister training leader when I was in Plattsburgh AND we went to high school together AND I had her dad for seminary! It's awesome

Sister Godfrey is great too I love them both.

Transfers are always an adjustment though. 

We still have 5 friends on date and have some really great friends progressing.

We are teaching a woman named Catherine! She is so humble and soooo elect! She loves President Nelson and she is waiting for her Book of Mormon in the mail, so pray that comes to her quick.

We had 5 people come to or watch church! It's amazing! I also gave a talk, and that went super well

Its been really, really cold here, but the snow has been gorgeous!

My Spiritual thought is from my talk which I based off of President Nelson's article in the Jan 2021 Liahona magazine.

President Nelson talks about the pattern for receiving revelation, but he shares this beautiful quote:

"If something is stopping us from opening the door to heavenly direction, we may need to repent. Repentance allows us to open the door so we can hear the voice of the Lord more frequently and clearly.

 “The standard is clear,” taught Elder David A. Bednar of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles. “If something we think, see, hear, or do distances us from the Holy Ghost, then we should stop thinking, seeing, hearing, or doing that thing. If that which is intended to entertain, for example, alienates us from the Holy Spirit, then certainly that type of entertainment is not for us. Because the Spirit cannot abide that which is vulgar, crude, or immodest, then clearly such things are not for us.”"

I really liked this quote. I know, sometimes we wonder why we aren't recieving answers and we should take a look inward at anything that may be keeping you from receiving revelation through the Holy Spirit.

That's about it for this week! I have some pictures this week.

Love,

Sister Thacker

Pictures

Sister Larsen and I saying goodbye, it was freezing!!

A small stop sign

Gorgeous drive to transfers through the Adirondacks

My cute new companions

Week 68 Weekly Email...

Hello! Another week has come and gone... transfers are this week, so stay tuned next Monday to hear the news.

2 transfers remain

This week we put 3 people on date for baptism!! Kelly, Garth and Stephanie.

Kelly is adorable. We had a lesson with her Monday night and we finished teaching her the Plan of Salvation. When we talked about the Celestial kingdom, she said she wants to live there. So we felt prompted to ask her if she knew the Book of Mormon was true. She said yes. Then we said, if the BoM is true, then that means this is Jesus Christ's true church on the earth today. She said, yeah, that makes sense! So we invited her to be baptized and then we invited her to pray about it right then. She said a beautiful closing prayer and in the middle of it, after she had asked the question, she said, "I think we already know the answer to that one." Then she got teary-eyed and said, "I think this is what God wants me to do!" She is so sweet and is really excited about baptism! We put her on date for March 13th!!!

We also officially put Garth and Stephanie on date. We taught them the Restoration and Stephanie loved it! She said she is ready to give her life to God! We also sent her the 20 minute first vision video and she said it was very moving. They are amazing!

We tried a new finding method. Basically we just pick a number in our area, for example (802) 733- then we just start at 0000 and go up from there... now this area is very rural. So 68 of the 69 calls we made during that half an hour were disconnected... it was a little mind numbing. The next day that we did it, we started at a higher number and we have talked to a lot more people, or rather left voicemails instead of calling and hearing *beep beep beep* or "the number you dialed is not in service". So that was nice to do something new.

That's the major stuff from this week.

Love,

Sister Thacker

Week 67 Hello again🖐

I have officially passed 100 days left... craziness!

Huge miracle this week! We were going to teach our friend Garth about baptism, so we call him and his girlfriend Stephanie wanted to join in as well!! So we got a new friend and invited 2 people to be baptized in one lesson!! They are amazing!! Stephanie loves the feeling of church and the wonderful community that we have  they also came to church on Sunday!

Our returning member Chris came to church again! And the members talked to him so much again, it was awesome

We had a good week and were able to tell people about the Book of Mormon and they are going to check it out! One man is getting one in the mail!

Spiritual thought for this week from an article in the Ensign of Feb 1984 by Elder Holland, "The Inconvenient Messiah"

"Cherish your spiritual burdens because God will converse with you through them and will use you to do His work if you carry them well."

I love you all

Have a great week!

Love,

Sister Thacker

A gorgeous sunrise from the other day

We also made bacon-wrapped little smokies🥓

bunny tracks in the cemetery

Week 66 2020 is Finally Over

Happy New Years everyone! I hope you all had a safe and fun holiday!

Some exciting things from this week:

- We talked to Peter again and dropped off some children's Book of Mormons for his kids. He said he will let us know when he is available to have lessons again! Keep praying for Peter.

- We had our district P-day last week. We played foursquare at a park. It was nice to be outside.

- We talked with an inactive member and invited him to come back to church. HE CAME YESTERDAY!!! He was welcomed by the Branch and he said he is excited to come back next week.

That's about it for this week... We did a lot of finding and worked hard. We are going to take a nap today and we are so excited!

My spiritual thought for all of you is to read the talk by Matthew Holland from this last general conference called, "The Exquisite gift of the Son of God". Its really, really good.

I love you all and I hope you have a great first week of 2021!

Sister Thacker

Sorry, we didn't take very many pictures this week that I felt like sharing... more to come next week, I promise!

Week 65 "I was dreaming of a white Christmas"

I hope everyone had a great Christmas!!

We spent Christmas Eve and Christmas Day calling people (those we know and random numbers) and singing Christmas Hymns! We had a lot of fun!

We talked to some fun people this week and even found a new friend! We also put our friend Tracey on date!

It's been a harder week, for a number of reasons, but I have been learning patience, charity and endurance from these struggles.

I know Jesus Christ knows exactly how I feel and I can turn to Him and rely on His grace and mercy. We can't be perfect in this life but we can only become better each day. And even then, we fall short. Only through the Grace of Christ can we return to Heavenly Father, on conditions of faith and repentance. Christ can work with even a desire to change and become better.

I love you all!

And I can officially say, I will see you next year! (3.5 months left)

Sister Thacker

Pictures

Our homemade Apple pie

Our failed monkey bread (we had instant pudding, not cook and serve)

Gingerbread house

Our "white Christmas" the whole 1.5 feet of snow melted...

Yummy Christmas dinner

My cute family on Christmas!

Week 64 MERRY CHRISTMAS!!🎄☃️🎅

Wow! What a week this has been...

I feel like I say that every week, oh well.

So for context we haven't found anyone new in 3 weeks and we haven't heard from Marissa or Peter. Our lessons have been pretty spotty too with Tracey, Gregory and Garth. It's been a lot of finding these past few weeks. Anyways! So we had interviews with President Vest on Friday and received some promptings on things we can do to improve. Since that day, we have found 3 new people!

One of them was from calling the box, another one was a former in area book, and the last one was a referral!

So we got the referral last night around 7:30 and we immediately called her. Her name is Donna and she is awesome! She answered and said, "Wow! That was fast!" after we introduced ourselves. She is looking for direction in her life and is excited to learn more about our church and even asked about baptism!

We also talked to this super sweet member yesterday. She answered the messenger call and had her bird on her head! She was so much fun to talk with!

The birds name is Birdie of course.

This week, we finally got snow!!! Approximately 1.5 feet of snow

Pictures will be included. We went out on one of our walks and decided to scrape off our car and try to shovel out the cars around us. It was so much fun! This was Sister Larsen's first real snow because she is from Texas. We made snow angels and trudged through the snow on our nature walk! Snow is so pretty!

We also made homemade snow icecream, she loved that too

We also started Caroling over the phone and people are loving it!

My spiritual thought comes from the First Presidency Christmas devotional from a few weeks ago. We have started sharing it our members.

Sister Craven said, "In a world so much in need of peace, our gentle words, our acts of compassion and kindness can be the means of wrapping another in a warm, swaddling blanket. I have come to understand that the more we act on promptings to serve others, the more heavenly blankets the Lord gives us to share. 

What promptings have you received? Who do you know that is in need of a heavenly hug? 

Our personal or virtual touch may make all the difference in the life of a loved one or even a stranger."

We have invited our members to think of someone who is in need of a Heavenly hug thus Christmas. A Heavenly hug can be anything from an actual hug to a simple act of service.

As this week of Christmas begins, I invite you all to think of someone who is in need of a Heavenly hug and to reach out to them in a simple way. I can promise you will feel the joy that comes from service and you will be able to help someone in their moment of need.

I love you all and hope you have an amazing Christmas! Drink some hot chocolate, sing Christmas songs, play in the snow, and most importantly, remember the true meaning of Christmas is the humble birth of our Savior and Redeemer, Jesus Christ

Love,

Sister Thacker

Photos

Lots of snow pictures

We also made Oatmeal Chocolate chip cookies

MERRY CHRISTMAS Y'ALL!

Week 63 🎶Grandma got ran over by a reindeer🎶

Hello everyone,

This week has been good, slow, but good.

We had transfers this week, Sister Johnson got transferred to North Syracuse. Sister Larsen and I are still here in Bennington! It's going to be good transfer.

So not a whole ton has happened this week with our friends, however, Garth came to church with his significant other Stephanie and his son. It's the first time we have had a friend come to church since I have been here in Bennington!

Its snowing right now and later this week it's supposed to be in the single digits!!

My spiritual thought comes from Saints Volume 1. I have been reading it during lunch and dinner, it's so good! It's been eye opening to even more of the hardships the Saints went through, and I have learned so much about the early members of the church. My testimony has been strengthened of the truthfulness of this Gospel.

If anyone has questions about early church leaders or History, I would encourage you to read Saints. It tells the History like a story from the journals of the early members! It's super interesting.

Anyways, my spiritual thought comes from Joseph Smith: “Every species of wickedness and cruelty practiced upon us will only tend to bind our hearts together and seal them together in love.”

We all go through hardships and no matter what Satan throws at us as a world, nation, church, or family, our hearts can be bound and sealed together in love as we look to Christ and rely on His Atonement.

I hope you all have an amazing week! Love you all!

Sister Thacker

PICTURES

We got Christmas presents from Sister Broberg, w/ antler headbands.

Our Christmas tree

Interesting picture I found while doing Facebook work... it also said, "no weiner dogs were harmed in the making of this picture"

Sister Larsen's chair finally gave out, these chairs are so old and worn, it was bound to happen sometime