Kazan Week 16 - "one last time :) hugs & love from Sister Wilson"

November 30, 2015

All is well :) 

Well here it is, my last letter. Never thought it'd come. Missionary work literally just feels like life, I feel like I don't know anything else. That's why president Schwab explains it as a "rebirth." :) I'll be taking a 10 hour bus ride down to Samara on Monday, and then flying out Tuesday night I assume... they still haven't really informed me on anything so I'm just gonna be assuming.

I've got a good 8 days ahead of me and I can't understand. I literally cannot grasp it. I remember I used to gasp when a missionary only have 2 months and when it was only 2 weeks I would already be saying goodbye. Here I am with no time under my nose and I can't feel the shock of it for ME but I sure could feel it for others! 

This week was a blur and just CRAZY. We had splits on Tuesday and Wednesday with the Sisters from Penza. Also... we had to plan the thanksgiving activity and a baptism, which happened to be on the same day. We went to a place which is like a Russian Costco, but it's called Ashaun, to get all the things for the activity and the baptism. All I have to say is that shopping is absolutely exhausting. It's over stimulating, I couldn't stand all the things to look at. So that's what I'm looking forward to as a mother... endless shopping :( it's okay I'll warm back up to it, I've always loved shopping until recently.

The baptism was wonderful. O and her family are so happy, and the father even baptized them! At 6:00 we had our thanksgiving activity and had to get ready for that where we were running around with our heads chopped off trying to get it ready. We made banana bread, brownies, carrots, fudge, mashed potatoes. The turn out was great :) we played minute to win it and some of the games were seriously hilarious. We had Elder and Sister Weight, the senior couple in Saratov email us for some ideas. Trying to open candy wrappers like reeses or kisses using mitten gloves or moving 25 m&m's from one plate to another using only a straw. :)

This week my companion made a comment that I noiticed is also applicable to myself, "If I do not purposefully choose to have faith, then I don't." Couldn't say anything more beautifully worded :) 

Also, this week I took some time to think about some of the most important things I've learned while I've been out here, and I've realized that they not only apply to me right now, but after the mission too. 

-I'm happiest when I follow promptings and hold nothing back

-Trials are lessons to be learned and opportunities to display faith

-The arm of flesh fails but Christ does not

-God ALWAYS delivers

-Happiness is a choice :)

-You cannot have faith, hope, or charity without humility

-God has the answers to all questions, but not an immediate place to put them

-We must have a broken heart in order to be cleansed and changed

-Jesus Christ is truly my Savior

I have learned who I am, and that I have weaknesses. I have learned what those weaknesses are and how to overcome them. Not saying that I HAVE overcome them :) But I think before my mission I just saw my weaknesses as strong emotions, and now I see them as they really are, which are things to be overcome. 

Today I'm grateful to be in Russia, to be a missionary. To feel the cold sting on my cheeks and offer eternal life in a world of gray.  I love the seasons. I'm grateful that I could see Kazan go from blazing hot summer to late fall and straight into crisp winter, watching leaves outside go from green to orange to brown to gone. I'm grateful for supportive companions who are my very best and loyalest of friends. I love my angel mom, my best friend, without her I would not be me. I'm grateful for my priesthood worthy father, he's loving and spiritual and goofy and protective and has taught me to be spiritual. I love my brothers, nothing is ever boring thanks to them and I'm glad they still remember that they have a sister (who could have been fifty times nicer but has hopefully grown up a little bit).  

I'm grateful that I've served a mission and that I have such a meaningful experience and time of my life behind me. I'm grateful for the Spirit and for those people who have helped to get me out here. I'm grateful for my God, who is so good. For his Son, who is my Shepherd and has saved me. He is the beginning and the end of my mission. He led me to to it, through it, and now he's taking me home. The Lord is and always will be my light. I know of nothing brighter. He is our light on the hill and he cannot be hid. I'm grateful for the opporutnity to have taken this light to the world. I know that the day will come when "every knee shall bow and every tongue confess that Jesus is the Christ" D&C 88:104. 

Every Knee Shall Bow - jkirkrichards.com

From Russia with love.....

Sister Brooklyn Wilson :)