Running Everywhere

Hello everyone! I hope you all had a great week! This week was very
good for us. Last Monday was Sister Matthew's birthday! The zone
leaders knocked on our door during exercise and took us to McDonald's
for breakfast. Later in the day we went to Hadleigh castle with some
of the district. I didn't think that the old ruins of a castle would
entertain us for hours, but we had so much fun!

We were so busy this week, which was amazing. The best days in a
missionary's life are the super busy ones. We were so packed with
appointments that we were literally running from place to place. We
would arrive to our appointments red faced and out of breath, but we
made it! Every missionary seems to have mastered the art of speed
walking. Sister Matthews can walk so fast! I am quite short and
usually have to jog to keep up, but at least I am staying fit!
We are teaching this great guy named Gerry from Scotland. We arrived
at his lesson out of breath and late because we had run there, but we
had a great lesson about the plan of salvation. He was so excited
about it and just seemed to soak it all up. I am excited for him, I
can already see how much the gospel is blessing his life.

After  we had a great lesson with an investigator named Aldrin, we were
talking with a member in town centre. A couple came up to us and asked
us, "Excuse me, but do you have a flyer for your church?" We were
almost in shock that someone had come and talked to us! We gave them
our card and told them about the church. They were fairly new in the
area and are looking for a new church to join! They noticed our badges
and were curious to know more about the church. We were so excited
that we got to talk to them. I noticed that they had an accent, so I
asked them where they were from. Turns out they are from South Africa!
Sister Matthews was so excited to see a fellow South African. They
even talked a bit in Afrikaans. They didn't come to church yesterday,
but we hope to be seeing them soon!

We had another cool miracle this week. A member from Lithuania had
invited her friend and her husband to meet with us! Their English is
very poor, so we will be helping them with English too. We say
something, and then the member translates it into Lithuanian, then
translates what they say back to English. Maybe I will start learning
Lithuanian!

On Sundays the buses don't run as regularly as they do during the
week. Yesterday we were waiting for the bus for ages, and when it
finally came, we were too distracted talking to each other that the
bus zoomed right past us before we could flag it down. We were
frustrated, but decided to walk to the next stop and wait there. As
soon as we left the stop, another bus zoomed past. We couldn't believe
we missed both busses right after each other! We just ended up walking
instead.

We had interviews with our mission president this week, which always
leaves me feeling inspired and pumped for missionary work. The
trainings we had were all about the atonement. We talked about how the
atonement is the core of everything we do as a church. I am so thankful
for the Book of Mormon which strengthens our understanding of the
atonement so much. I know that the Book of Mormon is true!

My address is:

Sister McFarland
9 Castle Road
Rayleigh
Essex
Ss6

7qd
England

I love you all! Have a great week!

Love, Sister McFarland

News from South end

Hello from South end on Sea!

This week has been good, not many exciting stories this week. Today is
Sister Matthew's birthday, the same as Meg! The elders came and knocked on
our or door at 6:45 this morning and we went out to McDonald's for
breakfast. They decorated our front door too. It was way fun! 

We have a lot to get done today for p-day so I don't have much time to write. Today
we will also be going to see Hadley Castle! I'm way excited. I'll make sure to send pictures. 

Love,
Sister McFarland

Southend on Sea

Hello everyone! This week has been good, and a bit crazy with
transfers. It was definitely sad to say goodbye to Ashford! I am going
to miss a lot of people there. But I am excited to be here in
Southend. I somehow managed to pack all my stuff in my suitcases, and
the next morning Sister  Swann and I left Ashford and met our new
companions in the Euston train station. We took more trains out to
Southend and managed to drag my suitcases up a gigantic hill. It
definitely gave us a good workout! Southend is a bus area, so it has
been confusing to figure out how buses work, as I have never taken
the public buses in Utah! The area here is quite a bit bigger here
than in Ashford. Luckily Sister Matthews is pro at the buses and
knows where to go!
So I guess it is natural to meet weird people on a mission, but I feel
like my first week here I have meet so many interesting people. One of
them is "Laughing John." He is a mad homeless man with long, white
hair and a big dark trench coat who walks around Rayleigh all day
laughing. Like, crazy 'evil scientist' kind of laughter. He doesn't
cause any harm or anything, he just laughs. Sometimes our
companionship study is interrupted by his crazy laughter as he is
coming up the street. I have been trying to get a video of him, but
every time I hear him laughing, I can't get my I pad fast enough to
record him before he is gone. Haha aw well. 

The ward here is really great! They are very supportive of missionary
work. Sunday I was getting a headache just trying to remember
everyone's names. I have to make notes of all the people I meet to
help me remember.
I am so excited to be with sister Matthews! She is from Durban, South
Africa. She is super sweet and kind. You would never guess that she is
only 12 weeks old, she is so good! I can tell that this transfer is
going to be amazing!
We had a really cool miracle with an investigator named Aldrin. Aldrin
has been investigating the church for a really long time, over a year
I think. We had a good lesson with him me we encouraged him to
pray.The next day he texted us to say that his friend who has been in
a coma for months just woke up! He had been praying for her. He said
that this really strengthened his testimony and he is excited to be
baptized at the end of this month.

I love you all! Have a great week!

Love,
Sister McFarland

Transfers!

It is transfer time again! I will be leaving Ashford and going to Southend! I am sad to leave Ashford, but excited for a new area and a new adventure! My next companion will be Sister Matthews from South Africa. 

Sister Swann and I have almost officially been called as primary teachers, as we have been asked last minute for the past 3 weeks if we could help out in primary. The first week they needed a pianist, so i just did my best to sight read a lot of the songs, then last week we helped out in sharing time, and this week were were doing singing time! We are really getting to know these kids well.

Our ward here is doing something called a 40 day fast. It is a relay fast where for forty days someone in the ward is fasting for the missionary work. The ward has done it twice before and it brought so many miracles to this area! Today is our day of fasting. I am so excited to see the miracles that come from this!

So sometimes when people see we are "sisters" they think that we are nuns. Yesterday we stopped this guy who was super rude and was saying the meanest things. Then he saw our badges and said "Oh I'm sorry, I didn't realize that you were sisters..." he even took back the pass along card that he threw back at us. Haha, we had a laugh about it afterwards. The funny thing was that at least three times that day people thought we were nuns. 

One thing I love about England is that there are a lot of really old, historic buildings next to brand new buildings. Yesterday we were in an area and tracted the most beautiful house that looked like Snow White's cottage. Turns out that that house was over 285 years old! It was crazy to think that it had been there since the 1800s. 

 

As far as missionary work, not much has happened.We basically have been finding for a whole week with not much success. We did have a really cool miracle with a woman named Becky! She used to meet with the sister missionaries about a year and a half ago. I remembered seeing her name and address in the area book, and thought we would just stop by and see how she was doing. She was way excited to see us and pretty much put herself on date to be baptized! She remembered what the sisters had taught her before, and before we had even got there decided to live by the church's standards. We are so excited for her! It really gave me hope to think that even when investigators drop us,( which happened to us a lot this week)  they will still remember the things they learned and the way learning the gospel made them feel. 

I love you all and hope you have a great week! 

Love, 

Sister McFarland 

Christmas in England

Hello everyone!

I hope you all had a magical Christmas. Christmas here in England was so wonderful, and I loved being able to skype my family. It was so good to talk to you all! 

We had a really lovely Christmas zone conference in London on the 17th. We had some really spiritual messages and musical numbers. After that we played a lot of fun Christmas games and everyone wore Christmas jumpers. President and Sister Stevens got us all pillowcases with the England London mission logo printed on them. It was such a fun zone conference! 

Straight after the conference I got to go on exchange with the sister training leaders. So Sister Swann andSsister Rank came back to Ashford, and I went with sister Fenu to Isford. The exchange was super fun and I really learned a lot from working with Sister Fenu.

I love Christmas time so much, but it is a rough time for finding. Apparently no one wants to be stopped by two missionaries right before Christmas. And as most of our investigators were on holidays, it was brutal trying to do missionary work. We ended up seeing a lot of less active members and visiting members in the ward. 

On Christmas Eve we did a lot of service with some members. We baked a ton of cookies and gave them away to people who might need a bit of cheering up this Christmas; and let's be honest, we ate a lot of them too.  That evening we had a carol concert at the church, where the whole ward gathered to sing carols. I love how much music can bring the Christmas spirit. After the carol concert, the bishop called all the missionaries up to the front. And I just want to say how amazing the ward is here in Ashford, because the whole ward had pitched in and bought us a huge box full of food, sweets, and gifts to make sure our first Christmas away from home was special. I don't think any of our eyes were dry. I was so touched and humbled by the ward and what they did for us. I love the people here in Ashford! 

For Christmas day, we spent the morning with Sister King and watched Big Hero 6 and Frozen. We had such a fun time with her! That evening we were with another family, the Drews. It was so much fun and we just felt included in their family. We played the cardboard box game, which is when you have to bend down and pick up a box off of the floor with only your mouth, and only your feet are allowed to touch the floor. The boys and the girls tied. We all got a bit stretched out and were really sore! 

We were expecting to transfer this week, but had a surprise call that transfers have been moved to next week, so I get to spend a extra week in Ashford! 

I hope you all had a really great Christmas! I love you all. Have a great week! 

Love, 

Sister McFarland 

Five Months!

Sister Swann and I passed our five month mark this week! It is so
crazy to think that we have been out that long already. Sister Swann
and I being the same age in the mission, it was fun to have our five
month mark together.

We had a district goal to find one new investigator every day for the
next week. At first we thought this was a crazy goal because we have
been struggling to find people to teach. But we really saw miracles
and we found so many people.

We had a ward Christmas party this week, which was really fun. We
watched the first presidency Christmas devotional. During the
devotional we were sitting by our investigator Lisa and her two little
girls Paris and London, who did not want to sit and watch the
devotional. So Sister Swann and I went to the back of the room with
them and brought out notebooks and sticky notes to colour with. They
loved it and were having a lot of fun. Soon other kids started
noticing how much fun we were having and wanted to join in too, so
then we ended up drawing with a bunch of kids in the back of the room,
and it became really hard to keep them all entertained with sticky
notes and pens.

Other than that it has been a surprisingly chill week. I am getting so
excited for Christmas! Sister Swann and I have been practicing singing so
that we can go caroling when we go tracting. I freaking love Christmas!
Love you all! I hope you have an amazing week and a Merry Christmas!

Sister McFarland

Pictures: 1. Helping make Christmas decorations
2. Drawing with Paris and London

Twins...Sister Swann x 2

I have a problem. I keep losing things. Like my badge. How I can lose
something that is always on me I have no idea. But the other day we
were in town and I was introducing myself and pointed to my badge as I
was saying my name, only do realize that I didn't have a badge! So I
have been borrowing Sister Swann's badge until I can get a new one.
Hopefully that will be really soon. So it has been confusing for
everyone we meet who sees that we are both Sister Swann, so once I
just said we were sisters.

We set up our Christmas tree last p-day. Our landlord was very kind
and got us a tree and some decorations. We are so excited for
Christmas! Town centre is all decorated with lights and a big tree. It
really brings the Christmas spirit. I love the church's Christmas
initiative "A Saviour is born." We have been sharing it with people we
meet. I would love to challenge you to invite someone to watch the
video, either by sharing it online or with a friend. This time of year
people are more open to learn about the true meaning of Christmas,
Jesus Christ. I love Christmas!

Tomas is doing well and is really excited for his baptism next week!
We are so excited for him. He is a great guy!

We had stake conference this week, so yesterday for church we were in
Gillingham at the stake centre. It was a really good meeting!

Sorry for the boring email, but not that much else has happened this
week. We just met a lot of weird people... But that is just part of
missionary life!

I love you all and hope you have a great week!

Love,
Sister McFarland