Savior, Make Me More Like Thee

email 01 Sep 2015

Soooo, my first 3 days back in Ogden Weber North have been nothing short of fantastic. Oh my. This week has been the most stressful and the most amazing week of my life. 

I don't remember if I've talked about the wisdom of Sister Richins. She. Is. So. Wise. Sister Betzold and I were talking about how we want to change the world. So we asked Sister Richins how we change the world. And she responds, without missing a beat, with:

"Be a missionary and raise good kids."

Wow. Well she just summed it all up. That's really how we change the world! I miss her randomly profound comments. But I'm loving being with Sister Smith again! :) 

Okay the musical fireside has been miracle after miracle!!! So like I said last week, it hasn't been working to do the song A Little More Like Thee. Well finally we decided to move on. So we googled songs with the phrase "more like thee" in it. And we fell in love with the words to the hymn "Savior, Make Me More Like Thee". These words are BEAUTIFUL and exactly the message we want to convey. We tried singing the words to different hymn tunes. We found some that worked. But none were anything spectacular. So I thought "maybe we can come up with a tune". So I started singing just to see what comes out. And it came out with the tune of "My Shepherd Will Supply My Need". Which was in this month's Ensign. So we looked up a choir arrangement of it by Victor C. Johnson and tried singing the words to it. We both looked at each other and knew instantly that this was the song Heavenly Father wanted us to do. We both got tears in our eyes and chills on our arms. It was one of the most spiritual experiences of my mission. It was a huge confirmation that we needed to do that song. 

So our first rehearsal for the musical fireside just happened to be on the same day that I was supposed to pack up and switch areas. That was a verrrrrry packed and stressful day! But Heavenly Father blessed us because everyone in the choir learned their voice parts super fast and we're all sounding AMAZING. We were a little worried since the mission split and we have half of the people. But I'm pretty sure Angels were singing with us. The whole chapel was filled with voices of praise and I can't describe the feelings of the spirit that was there. Heavenly Father has handed us the songs we need to do for this fireside and who needs to sing them. It's a lot of hard work. But man, it's worth it. 

I had a really embarrassing moment on Sunday where I dropped the sacrament tray. And it happened to be the water. And it happened to be the metal trays. #classicsistersarllsmove 


Sister Smith and I went to go visit people we had worked with in the past and they're all doing super good! No one had been by to Debbie's house since she got baptized so I was a little worried how she would be when we got over there. But when we went over there, we saw how prepared she truly was! Because she's been going to church every single week and she has received her temple recommend and she's getting ready to receive her patriarchal blessing!!! I can't explain how happy I was to hear all of that!!! Seriously! She's amazing! Then we went to go see Sandy and Trusie. They were baptized while sister Smith was in the area and they just got back to church while I was there. They've been going to church faithfully and have been 5 weeks clean from smoking and drinking and are on their way to the temple!!!!! MIRACLES ARE HAPPENING!!! It makes me so happy to see how all of these people are progressing. So Sister Smith and I have a couple of temple trips coming up :) ! 

We were having a lesson with Sandy and Trusie and we were talking about the sacrament washing our sins away and comparing it to a chalk board. How when were baptized and when we partake of the sacrament it's like Christ sprayed our chalkboard with a hose. And then Trusie said that doing it ourselves without the atonement is like erasing the chalkboard. It takes away what it says but in the end it just ends up smudging around the chalk and it's still on there. We need the atonement and we need the sacrament and baptism in our lives to fully clean our chalkboard. I thought that was a cool way of thinking about it and it made a lot of sense! We do what we can to clean it (works) and Christ takes care of the rest (grace). Our works lead to grace.

Man this week has been awesome and full of miracles. Im not looking forward to Sister Smith going home:/ but I'll survive! I get 2 weeks with her:) also we have an elevator in our house!!! SO COOL!!!

I love you all! 
Sister Sarlls