8/26/13

Christmas is the Best!

Well family, another week has passed.

Time is just flying by.

first!  Mother and Father, HAPPY ANNIVERSARY! :) i knew it was coming up and i was pretty sure it was this week. and i was right. so YAY!! thank you for finding each other and being obedient to the Lord. Because of you two, listening to the spirit etc. , I have been blessed with two of the finest parents in the whole world. I thank you and i love you both, very much.

last monday we were with sister Steffenson and sister Montag up in Arlington Heights, just goofing around for a while. Sister Steffenson and Sister Pankretz are good friends and so we went up to say goodbye to sister Steffenson, she went home on wednesday.  > weird to think of returning back to real life. 

anyways, then on Tuesday we went to the McNeils house for dinner and brother McNeil shared something very interesting about scriputres before that i want to share.  basically that Luke 17:34-36 is the three fold mission of the church. pretty cool, Christ taught that during his ministry and just another testimony builder that the church is true. anyways. all of you should read that and ponder that and tell me your thoughts. its great :) - dont forget to pray! 

but the McNeils are so nice, sister Pankretz and i really felt at home there, and we were relaxed and comfortable, and just so nice to be there, they made us delicious food and had good converstaion. we both really felt at home there with them.  it was nice. 

Sister McNeil is the one who takes us bike riding every monday morning. today we went, it was nice, but i was feeling terrribly sick while riding, so i was pretty slow. anyways, i went home and showered and ate and felt better. - i know its becasue i didnt get a good nights rest, its werid sometimes how many times i wake up. i dont get it... anyways. its good.

On Wednesday we had a lesson with Kim. she is still meeting with us which is great, but she is really afraid to leave her church. she has been there for 40+ years, it would be hard to up and leave everything you know. ya know?! but i had a first time experience with her. we taught her the lesson in a car. haha kim was running late and didnt have a chance to clean her house, and it was too dark to meet outside, so we met in Sister McNeils car, she was our member with us for that lesson.  So that was interesting. not the best way to teach a lesson, but fun and you could feel the spirit. hopefully she will come to church this next sunday. we'll see :) 

On saturday we met at the church again for church tours and Hillary came!  (no not my sister :) )  it was actually a very cool experience. Sister Pankretz and I on Friday had some extra time - so what to missionaries do?! we tract.   so we had picked a street before hand and we were driving along the street finding a place to park and she just stopped the car, and said "that house" and pointed to it. so we go up and Hillary comes to the door, well tell her that we are from The Chruch of Jesus Christ of LDS and she says, "oh! my mom gets visits from you guys, but it is usually two guys" we were confused because we are the only english missionaries in our area and we are sisters. - so we keep asking her questions and she says well im not really interested in your church becasue i really love Christmas, and i like to celebrate my birthday.  THE WHOLE TIME she thought we were JW's!  haha so we laughed and told her no. and explained. anyways. so she was actually very interested. we ended up talking with her for a good 12 min or so and left her with Mormon.org. she came to the church, had the tour and really liked it. and told us that she had read EVerything on mormon.org! it was great! so she is just awesome she has 4 kids, all adopted. she was a foster mom and adopted them all. and just an awesome lady. she told us she would come to church on sunday, but she didnt come. we waited for about 30 min outside for her. we were pretty bummed. but she will come next week. it will be good. we are going to see her thursday. 

also on saturday we went to Teris house. Teri is Gaels friend. (gael is the one who lives in the barn, GOLDEN investigator, and then moved to Utah) so we went to give service to Teri. we know that through service her heart will be softened to our message. she is actually very prepared for the message, she just doenst know it. YET.  hahaha....  her barn is even cooler that we thought. it has 2 more levels! this place is HUGE!!! it is just SO cool. and i would still buy it if i could. so beautiful.

oh so about the McNeils, their name used to be O'Neil. and so they were wondering if we were related. do we have that family chart that goes back (how far?)  could you send me a copy some how.   maybe i will just look on familysearch.org

also the story of the Red hand of.. ulster? ulser?  is that right? (hahaha)  .  i dont know if i tell it 100% correctly. could you send me a copy of that too?  thanks!   

I volunteered my self to sing for our ward on September 8th. EVERY sunday there is an intermediate hymn, and this ward chooses the WEIRDEST songs in the hymn book. so i thought i should change it up a bit. haha.  I am singing a really pretty arangement of "Savior, Reedeemer of my Soul"  I will send you a copy mom, and you can pretend i am there singing while you play the piano. :) 

i guess that is all for now. ta ta for now. 

peace and blessins.

Sister O'Neil  

Addendum

I almost forgot!

Sister Pankretz ate a hot HOT! chili - a thaibird pepper i think it is called, yesterday at a members. and it was the funniest thing!! she was crying and sweating. i got the whole thing on video!   hahah it was awesome. 

she said today that her intestines and butt are buring. hahaha  she brought this upon her self. hahaha anyways just a funny time :)

we were at their house for Abuletia Mangos birthday!  that is our nickname for Rosa Ortega.  Rosa is like our foster mom out here.   she is always giving us food and water and is so nice and goes out tracting with us a lot.  and just awesome. we love her and have good laughs with her. 

p.p.s. we are promised to have the holy ghost with us always as our comforter.  comforter in Greek means orphan.  the lord will not leave us as orphans. just a little something special. you are not an orphan to the Lord. :) he loves you.

ok for reals. love you all.

Hello all,                                                                                    8/19/13

this week i was nicknamed Irish, yelled at by a Jew (followed by a door slammed in our faces) and then had a wonderful dinner with our mission president. all in all it was a great week!! 

Last monday Sister Pankretz and I went to the mall to meet up with some other sisters and guess who i saw there?!?  COURTNEY LYONS!!  It was SO good to see her. she was my roommate last spring. i really miss all my friends and i was just happy to see her.  it was great! 

that day i also remembered just how tiring shopping is.  and its really not that fun. (well sometimes it is , but i was tired after that..) hahah but i did get a cute skirt for cheap. so that was fun! :) 

On tuesday we got up and helped a member in our ward. they are a young couple and both of them have pretty serious health issues. and i am sure it is hard with their two little ones. so we cleaned their house for them and helped with making breakfast for her and their two little ones. the Savages are their names.  anyways that was fun.  and then later we went and Watched the Testaments with a Less-active member and i almost cried again. I just love that movie. it is SO good. and the spirit is so strong every time i watch that.  so you should watch it too. 

We had another opportunity to provide service for an investigator her name is Susie Sherrick. and she lives in one of the houses owned by Aurora University. and her sister is the president of the university so she gets to live there. anyways she nicknamed me Irish and sister Pankretz Pancake. and that really is what she calles us. is pretty funny.  she is just awesome and makes up for our other investigator Gael who moved to Utah. but we did find out that she has had her interview for baptism and is going to be baptized on August 31st! so that is exciting! we are happy for her.  

on saturday we had (what felt like) nothing to do. It was a long day. AND we were waiting for transfer calls. so we were both anxcious to know if we were being moved or what not, and we are both staying here. i am happy!  it will be great. so all day we pretty much tracted.. all day.  most of the day no one answered or really were not interesed. its hard work. so we knocked on this one door and this really nice guy came and was very genunie, and kind. and so we said "we are representatives for the Church of Jesus Christ of LDS etc." and he just said. "oh, well im Jewish. So i Killed your Savior."  and then he  slammed the door and walked away. and i just laughed a little and said, have a good day! and then sister Pankretz kinda of medium yelled.. " you killed your Savior, stupid!" hahah it was a good laugh.  sad but a funny moment.  we also started church tours this saturday. it was the first one and it was for an hour from 2-3 and no one came. many reasons people didnt come. main one is the lack of support or enthusiasum from our ward, but that is another discussion for another time.  haha BUT.. sister Pankretz and I were there for that designated hour and so we had a great time giving the spirits a tour of the building.  we told them all about the chapel and showed them how the organ works, and taught them why we dont have crosses in our churches. they were very understanding. it was fun. and then we went and grabbed a late lunch and got a half cooked pizza, and we were trying to find a park to go and sit at and we came accross a black convention! I kid you not. there must have been 400 black people at this park.  and they were just sitting and standing around. it was really weird.it was like a giant tail-gate party.  

we drove away and i told sister pankretz that i was really tempted to go back and just get up on a table and just start preaching repentance to them.  haha in my dreams. i dont think i could ever do that. haha 

sunday was very good. we had an excellent talk given by a sister Clements in our ward and she talked about prayer, and how when we pray we have to go to the Lord with a plan. she realted it to Ice Cream. there are many different flavors of ice cream. minty, chocolatey, nutty, smooth, sweet etc. none of them are wrong. they are just different. each gives you a different experience.  the same happens in life, we have to make a choice as to what "flavor ice cream" we will have in life.  the Lord lets us choose our experiences.  none are right or wrong but we have to choose and go to the Lord.  and then he will help us with our choice.  most of the time it is right, because we have the Holy Ghost, but when it is totally wrong he will guide us and tell us to throw that Ice Cream away because it is no good. it has expired. but when we have choosen the right flavor he lets us enjoy it and enables us to get through the tough times. (or the nuts and the chewy parts, or  the sensiivity of the cold to the teeth.) anyways i really enjoyed that analogy.  prayer is great. i love praying, for many reasons.  

now everyone go eat some Ice Cream and enjoy it. :)  

I love you all. thank you for the letters and the support and love and prayers. tell me about your adventures.  Is everyone ready for school?!  i know Lisa and her kids started.

Peace and Blessings 

Love        Sister O'Neil     

8/12/13

"but you have not been baptized! " - nacho.

im sorry about all the nacho references. sometimes thats all ya got. BUT ill tell you this much:  ISAAC got baptized!!! it was so good!  (here is a picture of sister Pankretz and I with Isaac.)  Saturday was awesome. we got up early and got ready because we had to be there 2 1/2 hours early to fill the font and so we were there studying and stuff at 7:30.  and then we set up.  a lot more people than i had expected came for it. there was a lot of support fromt he older crowd in this ward. but we also had our other investigator come Keith. so that was good. and he was very well fellowshipped and we didnt even get the chance to talk with him till after the whole thing. so that was exciting.  Isaac doesnt show much emotion but after he came out of the water he was so happy. it was awesome.

then on sunday he came to church and as he was walking down the hall towards the chapel. he had a spring in his step and his countenace was SO different. It was amazing!!! he was glowing!! :) it was awesome. and he was so happy. just a comeplete difference. hes a cool guy. now we just have to work on helping his mom understand the priesthood authority and she will get baptized too! :) 

monday we just had a really relaxing day. but it turned out to be some what of a bummer day because our GOLDEN investigator Gael, called us and told us she was moving. so she moved to Utah on Saturday, to live with her friend Whitney. she did it to get out of the smoking enviornment she was living in and she was facing a lot of persecution and trial living with her friend. we are proud of her and her decision to take her self out of that but sad to loose her to Utah.  oh well. she said she will come back. we dont know when she will be baptized yet but it will be sooner than october :) 

on tuesday we had zone meeting and it was so good! President Fenn is such a good teacher. i just love his lectures and he is just KNOWS HIS SCRIPTURES its amazing.   He talked a lot about faith and about the importance of having good thoughts and focused thoughts. it was really good.  dont know what else to say about that.  haha  

ok on Saturday Sister Pankretz and I went on spits. so we met up with the Hermanas from our area and one sister and one hermana went out together. I dont know WHY they put Hermana Lane and i together because we have pretty much been out the same amount. so here we were two newbies just walking the streets of Aurora IL, and low and behold we ran into a preacher. NOT just any preacher, the preacher from Keiths chruch. (our investigator Keith) . anyways. he had a lot of questions and pushed us and it was a good learning experience. there are a lot of things i can really improve on. but it was good. i was definetly out of my comfort zone. he almost wanted to bible bash with us, but i asked him a couple of questions that made him think. and so he didnt get as contentious. but at the very end he said "i hope you two ladies find the truth someday!" haha we get that a lot. and then he prayed for us. but in his prayer it was very respectful and he just prayed for our safety and thanked the Lord for our Zeal and used the phrase "lord" or "father" or "father, we pray" almost every other word. It was intense. almost made it hard to pick out what his point was or what he was praying for. 3 Nephi 17 .. something like that. avoid vain repetition.   anyways. now i know why.  

but I also learned from this just how important knowing the bible is.  a LOT of people here really know the bible and study it. there are people at both ends of the spectrum they either really know the bible and read and study often or have no idea. its interesting.  Hilary, i keep thinking about how you were interested in seeing how much i would have to use or be confronted about the bible. its a lot. probably 60% of the doors we knock on they bring up something. but the 4 or 5 thai people, or people who tell us they are buddist have NO idea who Jesus Christ is. Its really weird.  one guy was like"  Oh!! is that the guy on TV that they are always telling me about. hes like the one with the beard and the dirty feet." haha his description of him was funny to me. it was sad that that was all he knew about Christ, but hopefully he will come to know of the truth in this life. 

So it was a really good week. I enjoyed it a lot. and I am just loving this ward more and more. they are just so awesome and I love getting to know all the different characters.  It is very similar to home ward. its kinda weird, but in ward council yesterday I felt like i was at home because our bishop is young like bishop Evanson, and the High Priest Group leader here reminds me of Dad. so its fun to see the similarities. anyways. 

Just remember the church is true, and satan will do all he can to make you question your testimony. just build yourselves on a firm foundation in Christ and all will be well. 

love you all!!!

Sister O'Neil 

8/5/13

"people think i dont know a butt-load of crap about the gospel, but i Dooo" - Nacho Libre.

 

but in all seriousness, this week i have realized just how much I Dont know about the gospel. I mean i guess that initially hit me when i was in the MTC but this week for some reason i have just realized how much i have to learn. its a great thing because i am excited to learn it and apply it to my teaching. My companion is great and has helped me in my efforts to learn as much as i can. i am excited.  on one subject of the many things to learn, i was reading a book on the restoration. and i learned that all three of the 3 witnesses of the BOM left the church. and that they never denied their experience. they just left. but i guess i knew that i just needed to be reminded. anyways then i also learned that when the 3 witnesses and Joseph went to pray to have the angel show them the plates, it was in the middle of the day, ANd that while they were praying nothing was happening, and so MArtin Harris knew that he shouldnt have been there, so he left and the angel came and showed the 3 of them. and then joseph went and found martin praying and the angel came again to just the two of them.  didnt know that. dont know if that made sence. but it was cool to me.  anyways.

 

DAD: two things i had this week that reminded me of you and i KNOw you would LOVE.  flan- with coconut on the bottom.. so delish!! and A chocolate CAke shake from portillos. SO DELISHIOUSLY YUMM!!!! they literaly take a piece of their famous chocolate cake and put icecream in a blender and mix it up and give it to you. SO good!  just the way you like it. mushy!

 

I also had Goose Island root beer this week. it is famous to Chicago and very good.  it isint too fizzy. its nice. Riley, have you had this?

 

Tuesday we had a "new missionary training" meeting. with all the new missionaries and their companions. which was more than half the mission. President Fenn talked to us multiple times and it was SO GOOD! i learned SO much in that meeting. He talked about 10 things the devil doesnt want us to teach, and is attacking int he homes.  very interesting.  but one of the things that really stood out to me was the importance of the restoration. I mean it is extremely important, but he made a point that revelation didnt begin at the first vision. revelation for Joseph Smith came at the time he read JAmes 1:5.   he explained that if he had not the revelation to go and pray and interpret the scripture to fit his life he had pondered the scripture for some time and then made the decision, it would have never led him to go and pray in the grove.  very interesting to me.  so ponder scriptures :)

 

then wednesday and friday are big days. we will come back to them

thurday we went and painted Sue Ellen Smith's house. she is awesome and just a sweet lady. we painted for her a couple of weeks ago, but went back to paint another room. 

 

ok. wednesday we got a headquarter refferral. we didnt have a chance to call or go and meet this person yet and then we recieved a call from Utah. We usually dont pick them up if they arent from our area, but they had called 3 times so we called them back.

This lady's name was Whitney and her friend here Gael Westphal wanted a book of mormon. Whitney and her husband in Utah sent her one with their testimony in it and then told her that she would contact us to have us come and teach gael.   Whitney also told us that Gael was anxious for our call and was sad that we hadnt called her. (we had just recieved it and hadnt had a chance.) any ways we called Gael and she is just As golden as gold. i mean she is so ready for the gospel it is incredible. she is going through a divorce and she pretty much woke up one day and said. the church is true. Whitney was her nanny 25 years ago in New York and so she knew about the gospel that way. so we went and met her on Friday. she was Extremely receptive to the restoration and understands it all. she is a fun, loving woman so open and just not afraid to ask us questions. she is already a missionary because she is re-teaching to her roommate all that we are teaching her. and she said that Terry (her RM) wants to sit in our discussions and "even if shes not interested, at least we are planting a seed." my reaction was wAHT!??! is she mormon! so cool.  so we invited her to be baptized. she said yes! but.. it wont be till october 10th because she wants her friend from Utah to do it. (well her friends husband thomas).  so we will be meeting with her 2 times a week until then! so excited. hope i dont get transferred. i would be so sad.  Then on Saturday we went and helped her do yard work at the place she is living we got to listen to Adele playing in the back ground. oh how i love Adele. . OH!!! how could i forget/. she lives in a BARN!! it is so cool!! its this big old red barn and she lives with Terry. see gael is from Georgia and is just here for a while. so we went and helped them pull weeds on this big 2 acre lot that their house and barn are on. and make it look purdy! they are preparing to sell it. if i had $370,000 i would buy it. tear down the house and rebuild. it is SO beautiful. i will take pictures next time we go out and send them :)

  

 

Then we went  straight to our next appointment. this was with Herman and Tina. they are married and so awesome. we only had about 15 min to meet with them but during our lesson Herman got up and went to get something. you would NOT believe what he came back with...... A QUAD! like all of the scriptures quad. It was crazy! he said he had read it all. cover to cover. and he said "its the bible and the book of mormon all in one book. just like it should be."   i thought he was a member and just pullin our leg.  like maybe a less active member idk. hes a jokester so i thought maybe. and so sister P and I asked him "are you mormon" and he said no. but it was so funny! AHH it was amazing. they are both really receptive as well. and look forward to meeting witht them. we love them all!!

right before we went in to Herman and Tinas this little black nissan drove by and started yelling at us "hermanas!! Hermanas!!" and we looked around and these two mexican tiwn ladies were yelling at us. they wanted us to go to this house and "save brenda" we were so confused. we didnt know why they were sending us there. so after their lesson we went over to this house and we went in and found out that Brenda was a sister to the twins and her mother  or mother in law or grandma or something. someone is dying. she was there on a hospital bed surrounded by 3 catholic ladies singing her "songs to god" in spanish. she has cancer and a couple other things. basically dying. we couldnt communicate well with them because they only spoke spanish. so anyways we were just kind of sitting there. and the grandma asked us to sing. so ssiter P told me i had to because she cant carry a tune.i agreed. and i had No idea what to sing. the only thing that came to my mind was "o divine redeemer." hahahah so i sang the chorus to that song. ahah and i felt like Aunt Rose singing at a funeral.i know it wasnt nearly as good as how Aunt Rose can sing it.  anyways i felt bad for singing that song just because i have always associated it with funerals and death, and so i felt like i was sing this little mexican ladys swan song.  haha oh well. sister P and i both still dont know why we were went to that house. oh well it was funny.  

 

it was a good week to say the least. i loved it. and look forward to this week., we have a zone meeting tomorrow and will be taught by president again. SO excited!  did i tell you that he is  buddy buddy with Elder Oaks or Nelson. something like that. anyways. sometimes he will be a the puplit and get a phone call mid sentance and just walk out and answer it. he comes back and says. "you all know who that was."  haha hes awesome.   

 

this is an amazing work! I love it so much,. thank you for the letters and love..  Oh i got 10 letters this week! it was awesome! thank you friends and family! i loved it!! :) so good!!

 Made my week! and day! 

All is well in Chicago. its been cold this week, especially at night. but its been nice.

 

peace and blessin's

 

Sister O'Neil