Tread Carefully

This week has been good here in Dereham. We have continued to see miracles and meet amazing people. recently we have been trying to work more with the members. 

Member missionary work is so key. Sister Cabral and I are both pretty new to the area, so we have been really working on gaining the trust of the ward. The ward here is fantastic! This past week we had the opportunity to have dinner at a members home who I didn't know very well. It was their first time having us over, so we wanted to make a good impression. When we walked into the dining room, I quickly moved around the table to shake everyone's hands because I was so excited to meet everyone. But in my excitement, I failed to notice the large hutch next to the table full of willow tree figurines that I think every Mormon family has somewhere in their home. I happened to hit this hutch with my shoulder quite hard, and to my horror, the whole hutch shook precariously and I watched as all these beautiful figurines all fell off and hit the floor, with quite an impressive loud noise. So much for good first impressions! Thank heavens, none of them broke. So I quickly tried to pick them back up, although the member encouraged me to just sit down so I didn't make it worse. After the shelf was back in order, we finally sat down, (my face was more red than a tomato), and everyone at the table erupted in laughter. It actually turned out to be a great ice breaker. (although I wouldn't recommend doing it to gain members trust.) 

Autumn is here, the air is getting colder, the leaves are changing colour, and tight season is back. 

I am so grateful for this gospel. It has blessed my life in so many ways. I know that this church is true! 

I love you all! 

- Sister Adriana McFarland

The Trio's Down to Two

Hello everyone!

Apologies about last week. It was a super crazy day! It took up most of the day to get Sister Maughan to London and then to come back again. There were a lot of delays on the trains so we didn't get back until after 10pm. late nights make for long weeks. 

The week was good, but it has been sad to not have Sister Maughan with us. I always seem to go through companion withdrawals when a companion leaves.  

This week we had a cool miracle. We were street contacting and found a woman from Portugal who speaks no English. She had met missionaries before, but because of the language barrier, she turned them away. But now that Sister Cabral can teach her in her own language, she is so excited about the gospel! We have a few members here who are also Portuguese who can help translate during the lessons and at church. As with many other different cultures in the past, I have been learning a lot about Portugal recently and I love it so much!  I am also trying to learn some phrases in Portuguese so I can speak to our new friend. We will start to teach her English this week as well. 

 

I have found that English people are very helpful. Asking someone to help you is a much easier way to start a conversation here than a lot of other approaches.  Yesterday, I asked a woman if she could give us directions to town. She happily told us a series of complicated directions, that didn't make much sense. I also knew that the directions she was giving us were incorrect. Haha, so after following her directions for a little while, we decided to go back to the path we were on and follow the trusty map. It's kind of like a metaphor for life.  People will point us in the wrong direction, and if you don't know where you are going, or get direction from the wrong people you can end up being lost. That's why I am so thankful to be a part of this church where I know that we can receive the right directions that lead us back to our Father in Heaven. The church is true, the Book is blue, and we go out two by two! 

Have a great week!

Love,

Sister Adriana McFarland 

The Three Musketeers

Hi Everyone! 

This will be a short email because right now I am on a train to London! We are going there to drop off Sister Maughan. She leaves tomorrow morning for Atlanta! So now our trio is down to two. 

Things are going well here. The work has picked up a bit and the ward is really great. 

Here is a picture of us at a service project this week.

Love

Sister Adriana McFarland 

An Unexpected Journey

Hello everyone!
Well, as promised, I have had the most CRAZY week of my mission, and
will hopefully have a more interesting email this week.

It started last Monday, as sister Maughan and I were joining a family
for a lovely family home evening. Then, the assistant to the president
called us with some interesting news: he told us that because Sister
Maughan will be leaving to go to America on the 11, we will be in a
trio until she leaves! When we asked him when we would be getting our
new sister, he told us that our new companion will be coming from the
MTC (missionary training centre) tomorrow and that we needed to drop
all of our plans to get there to meet her at 10 the next day.

So, after arranging and re arranging the flat to fit 3 people, and
cancelling all our plans, we headed off to London bright an early the
next morning to meet our new companion: Sister Cabral. She is from
Madeira Island, Portugal. She came late because she stayed longer in
the MTC to learn English. She is lovely and I am excited to work with
her!

We had to travel to London again  on Thursday for the new missionary
meeting. Usually this meeting happens after three weeks, but because
Sister Cabral came in the third week of the transfer, it was more like
a 3 day meeting for us.  It's nearly a 3 1/2 hour journey to London
from Dereham, so we have spent a lot of time traveling this week.
Because we had to be in London so early on Thursday, we spent the
night in the Norwich sisters, Sister Smiddy and Sister Benson's flat.
It was so fun to be back in Norwich, even if it was just for a day!

Being in a trio is fun, and really different to anything I am used to.
It is also interesting to be training two new missionaries at the same
time. Sister Maughan is on the last few weeks of her training
anyway,but our companionship has been running purely on greenie faith
and the Spirit.

I loved watching General Conference, and I hope you all had the chance
to watch it too! It is so amazing that we have living prophets and
apostles on the earth today who lead and guide this church. I really
felt the spirit strongly durning the conference, and I know these men
are called of God. If you didn't get to watch it, find time to watch
it this week. If you did watch it, make sure you review the talks and
your notes and set a plan of action of what you will change from now
on.

I love this work, and I love the gospel with all my heart.
Shall we not go on in so great a cause?
Have a great week!
Love,
Sister Adriana McFarland

Dear Old Dereham

Hey beloved family and friends!
First of all, I would like to formally apologise for the decline in
the quality of my emails recently. I'll make sure more exciting things
happen this week to write about next week.

Yesterday was great, because Simon, a recent convert who was baptised
2 weeks ago was finally confirmed! He went to hospital shortly after
his baptism, so his confirmation had to be delayed until he came home.
I was also spontaneously asked to share my testimony during sacrament
meeting. Afterwards, Simon thanked me for my testimony and
congratulated me on my good English. He said it had improved a lot! I
was a bit confused, as I wasn't aware that I struggled with English in
the first place. I did remind him that I was American and that English
was my first language. He still didn't quite understand. I don't know
if he thought that we spoke a different language across the pond or
what.
Also, I had a random kid come out of the bathroom and dry his hands on
my tights. A bit random, but hey, we are good friends now.

I am so excited for General Conference this week. I love to hear the
inspired words of the prophets and apostles. We are so blessed to have
a living prophet on the earth today, and that we can hear from them
every six months at general conference. So have your questions ready
to be answered this weekend!

Love you all!
Sister McFarland

Joys of Mission Life

This week has been incredibly refreshing. The teaching pool has been dry for a long time, and the past four months have been full of street contacting, tracting, and seeing little success in the work. This week we were blessed with a flood of miracles as we finally began to see some progress, and our teaching pool has begun to fill back up!

On Saturday night, we were sitting at the bus stop as we cheekily stole some WIFI from the bank across the road to do some online proselyting. Right before we were about to leave, a woman came and sat down next to us. Sister Maughan started talking to her. Her name is Gabi and she is from California and has just moved here to go to uni. (as they call universtiy here). We talked for a long time, and she was very receptive to the gospel and wanted to learn more! We invited her to church, and agreed to meet her there the following morning so we could walk to church together. The next morning, right before Gabi came, another woman came up to us and said: "Sisters! where is the church? We are looking for the chapel." It turns out that she is from another ward, and she and her family were visiting Dereham for the day. Right then, Gabi came, and so we all piled in the car together to go to church. Gabi loved church, and the spirit was so strong. The members who gave us all a lift helped her so much at church.  We are excited to work with her and help her prepare for her baptism next month. 

We had another exchange this week with our sister training leaders, Sister Phillips and Sister Matthews. I got to go with Sister Matthews, who was my companion in Southend over 6 months ago. It was so much fun to be with her again and to relive our time in Southend! 

 This church is true, and I am so thankful to be a missionary and to get to be a part of this great work. Shall we not go on in so great a cause?

I love you all. Have a great week! 

Love,

Sister McFarland  

The Spontaneous P-Day

Hello to everyone from Dereham! It has definitely been weird to be
back in Norfolk. Us getting here was quite an adventure!
So because both sister Topp and sister Maughan are waiting for a visa
to go to America, they had to have an appointment at the U.S embassy
in London early Thursday morning. The assistants to the president told
us that we would be staying Wednesday night in London so that we could
be on time to their appointment the next day, but they didn't tell us
much else. So after getting our new companions, Sister Topp, Sister
Maughan, Sister Syddall, and I went to the mission home to figure out
what was happening. The assistants to the presidents were a bit busy
as they were trying to sort out 26 new missionaries coming in, and
because they wanted us out of the way they told us to take another
Pday in London! It was by far the weirdest day of my mission, as we
didn't have any plans at all, and I felt like a waster, but what could
we do? We saw some fun London things, and got lost in the great and
spacious building. (Harrods).
The next day was successful however because both Sister Topp and
Sister Maughan got their visas approved! They will probably be off to
America in 5 weeks. It will be so hard to send them both off at the
same time!

We finally made it home to Dereham on Thursday and it was such a
relief to be back to regular missionary life. Dereham is such a cute
little village! It is very English. I am so excited to serve here! It
is weird to be back in the Norwich district. We had a district meeting
last week in the Norwich chapel, and it brought back so many memories
of my time there with Sister Chou!

We had a cool experience this week when we were finding. We met a
woman on the street who has really been going through a rough time. We
told her that God loves her, and she just hugged me and started crying
in my shoulder! The gospel truly can heal our souls if we let it, and
I hope as we teach this woman more she can come to feel that in her
life.

I love you all! Have a great week!
Love,
Sister McFarland