An Easter Full of Grace

Dear Family,

Happy Easter everyone! It was so good to hear about everyone's day! I'm sorry that the house was kinda empty, I was thinking about it and I don't think I've been home for an Easter in over four years! College, China, Mission, they kinda get in the way of things :). It was such a wonderful day here! I kinda woke up in a little bit of sad spirits but the Lord poured out His tender mercies and there was joy to be found throughout the entire day. We had members invite us over to join with them in Easter egg hunts, we also got invited to go with a member and her non-member friends to a St. Michael's Cathedral to listen to students from Eastman School of Music sing the Easter story. SO INCREDIBLE! The Cathedral was beautiful, and you really could feel the spirit of the music in there. I loved it. Sister Stoker and I were asked, in Sacrament Meeting, to share our testimonies to the ward. It was such an experience to be able to stand in front of people that I have grown to love, and bear testimony of the Savior's reality and personal experiences that have helped me come to know Him. The best part of the day, though, was at night when Sister Stoker and I read the Easter story together. I don't know why but I feel like everything means even more to me on a mission. I rejoice in the statement that "He lives!" and add my witness that He does.

Other than that things have been pretty normal. We work a ton at the sites so that keeps us really busy. Sister Stoker and I are trying not to feel overwhelmed with the task of taking on two areas and only getting a couple hours in our area every day. I've been relying a lot on Grace this week. A friend gave me a talk, out here, that has forever changed my mission. It is called "Believing Christ" and it is by Stephen E. Robinson. He talks about how we understand that none of us are good enough for the Celestial Kingdom. From the scriptures we learn, time and time again, that "no unclean thing can enter into the Kingdom of God". That we will try and try to be who we know that we should be, but because we are human, we will continue to fail. In this talk he says, "We want to be with our Father in Heaven. But no matter how hard we try, we come up short. At some point all of us must realize, 'I can't do this by myself. I need help.' Then it is that the Savior says, in effect, All right, you're not perfect. But what CAN you do? Give me all you have, and I'll do the rest." Then Bro. Robinson sums it up, "He still requires our best effort. We must keep trying. But the good news is that having done all we can, it is enough. We may not be personally pefect yet, but because of our covenant with the Savior, we can rely on HIS perfection, and his perfection will get us through." How grateful I am for that! I am so grateful for the enabling power of the Atonement which is Grace! So, Sister Stoker and I continue to plung forward. We are going to try and give all we can and then we're going to stand back, and watch the miraclesh happen.

I hope all goes well with the visit with Dr. Te. I'm praying that news is good news and that these treatments will have been doing their job. I hope you know that I still pray for you, every day. That the angels will take care of you and that I will live worthy to qualify our family for the blessings we need. I'm so excited to get to hear all of your voices on the phone in TWO WEEKS! (We MAY even get to use Skype, thats not official but I'm crossing my fingers that it will get approved). I"ll hopefully let you know more next week.

Well I love you all. I wish you the best of weeks.

Love always,

Sister Carter

Brenda's Baptism

Dear Family,

Whew! Another week- GONE! I am now halfway through my mission! So crazy! I still feel like I have so much learn and now I'm running out of time to learn those things! I'm so blessed to get to be out here to learn so many lessons about myself, others, and the gospel. It is such a growing experience. One that takes all the strength I have, every day I wake up.
I'm so excited that Kyle had such a wonderful experience going through the Temple! He was much more prepared than I was (even though it sounds likes he got about as much sleep as I did :)). I wish I could have been there to hear his talk in church. I'm so proud of my little brother! I tell everyone about him and his mission call. Everyone is so fascinated that he was called to that mission right before all the disasters happened. I know that that wasn't a mistake, there is a real purpose for him being sent there at this time. I'm so excited to see the wonderful man he's turning into. I had a dream about all of you last night! I was over at our ward mission leader's home, and you were all waiting for me! I got to hug each one of you and I got to see little Atreyu. He wasn't even scared of me and I got to hold him for a little while. It was such a sweet wonderful dream. A tender mercy for a girl who still misses her family.

So the big news.... DRUM ROLL EVERYONE....... Brenda is now a baptized member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints!! I hear the angels singing the "Halleljuah" chorus now. What a wonderful blessed day it was. There was quite a few members of the ward that came to support her. She was a little nervous but everything went smoothly (except the water was boiling hot again... I guess there is no cool water in this font. I guess we are serious when we say they are going to be "baptized by fire"). The most tender part about the whole things was the next day in church when her husband was able to give her the gift of the Holy Ghost in Sacrament meeting. He gave the most wonderful blessing where he talked about being able to go to the Temple together in the near future to be sealed for time and all eternity. They have their eyes set on the Temple. I am just in awe and am so grateful that because we are members of the restored gospel that we have the opportunity to be eternal. That Brenda and David's love for each other will never end... Good things don't have to end.

So the other big news. Transfers. So like I predicted, it was a big one. Seven sisters went home and four new ones came out (there are about 34 sisters in this mission- that is A LOT). Sister Stone and Sister Van Den Berghe (one of the Webster sister that I lived with), were part of the seven who left. It was very sad to say goodbye. Sister Holm (the other Webster sister I lived with) was sent to Buffalo and my companion, Sister Gines, was sent to Fairport. So... that just leaves me. I'm still in Irondequoit. They actually combine the Irondequoit and Webster areas... so now I am serving in Webdequoit :). Its quite a big area, and a lot to take on. I have a GREAT new companion though. Her name is Sister Stoker, she is from Idaho. She is such a sweet good person. I'm still trying to find something that is wrong with her.... I'm so excited to get to serve with her and we're excited to get the work moving. I was a little sad to say goodbye to the three sisters that I loved so much, but I realized how grateful I am that it WAS sad to sad goodbye to them. It is good that we loved each other enough that it is hard to move on. My new favorite quote from this last Conference is, "Thank you, Gardener, for loving me enough to cut me down". I am continually humbled, time and time again, on a mission. It always seems like there is something that comes up that is hard to work through, or that I don't quite understand but I'm so grateful to know that we have a Father in Heaven who LOVES us, and that the only reason He gives us these trials, to experience, is because he's trying to make us grow into something beautiful. I am also grateful that He loves us enough to not just cut us and leave us to grow on our own. He's with us, every step of the way. I know that is true.

Well family, I love you. Thank you for the wonderful Easter package! It brightened my day! I love you all and will be thinking of you all this Sunday a lot. Have a wonderful Easter!

Love always, Sister Carter

"Continue in Patience" April 12, 2011

Dear Family,

Well... now I am writing to you on a Tuesday. Our schedule is going to messed up for awhile. I'm glad that you had such a wonderful weekend in Arizona! It is starting to feel like Arizona up here (Okay not THAT warm but it was in the 70s on Sunday. PARADISE!). Its been so humid and warm it keeps feeling like we're on vacation somewhere. I'm loving every minute of it. I'm so happy to see the green grass out. It seems like I just wrote to you a very short while ago so I don't have as much to report on now. Transfer calls are coming up this weekend and we're all pretty nervous about it. This time there are going to be A LOT of changes that happen, namely that seven sister missionaries are leaving the mission (including my trainer Sister Stone- so sad), so there is going to be a lot of reshuffling. I've tried to guess what will happen to me but I absolutley have no idea so its a good thing the Lord is the one in charge of where we go and who we're with.

We've been busy this week preparing for B's baptism. We ended up having to push it back a week because we weren't able to get all of the lesson in that we needed to, with our schedule changing we hardly have any time in our area anymore. We are learning a lot about time management. So she is going to be getting baptized this Saturday at 11 am. We are SO excited! She is doing SO great. She wakes up early every morning to read from the Book of Mormon and has already made it to 2 Nephi. She is so great about understanding up on the stories and applying them into her life. She truly is a blessing to us, a chosen daughter of our Heavenly Father, and I know that He is going to be very proud of her decision this Saturday.

I read the most incredible talk this week by President Uchtdorf from the last May 2010 Conference called "Continue in Patience". I've decided that patience is one of my lost virtues :). One of the things that I expected when I came out here on a mission was to be perfect. It just made sense! When you become a missionary you become instantly perfect. You have no more desire to do evil, you know how to talk to everyone, you are completely focused all the time, everyone loves you, you are able to follow every rule with exactness. All the missionaries that I have met have just seemed so perfect and when I first got out here I was frustrated that I was not. Frankly I still get frustrated at myself. I know what to do -so why don't I just do it! President Uchtdorf's talk was an answer to my prayers. He says, "Patience is a process of perfection. The Savior Himself said that in your patience you possess your souls. Or to use another translation of the Greek text, in your patience you win mastery of your souls." Winning mastery of our souls. I guess that is what this life is all about. Choosing the spiritual over the carnal. Choosing the eternal blessing rather than the instant gratification. It all comes down to patience. Patience that we are moving in the right direction. One of the most patient people that I can think of in my life is Mom. I don't ever remember Mom being impatient with me. I know there are jobs that she could have done a lot better than I did but she patiently let me do them because she wanted me to learn how. I think that can sure apply to our Father in Heaven as well, who is an Perfected Being because of His perfect patience. Anyway... hopefully that makes sense. I've just been thinking about that a lot lately.

I'm so glad that Kyle is going through the Temple, hopefully he is able to handle it a little better than I did my first time :). I love you all so much. You mean everything to me. I hope you have the most amazing week, I'm always praying for you.

Love always, Sister Carter

I Loved Conference!! April 7, 2011

Dearest Family,

Well here I am!! Four days late but still alive :). Our Preparation Days are now going to be changing because we are now working at the sites 4-5 days a week. Hopefully we'll start to get a routine going... I think I'll be emailing next Thursday again. We're going to try and get to the Temple sometime this next week. I'm so excited, its been so long.

I'm so glad to hear that everyone is well! I loved hearing everyone's favorite talks from Conference because everyone liked something different. It really is like Elder Holland talked about, one of their messages is really meant just for us. Personally, I loved Elder Oaks talk about our desires and how they determine who we end up becoming. I've been thinking a lot about that lately and how we can turn our desires into actions and he just laid it out perfectly for all of us to understand. I LOVED Conference! It is such a feeling of home and refuge. Not even for the reason that I knew all of you at home were watching it, but because we will always be safe and taken care of when we listen to what these chosen servants have to say. Its funny, Dad, that you talked about me sneaking into the Priesthood session because I DID!!!! HA! We snuck in to hear Elder Anderson's talk and then we left because we felt a little weird :). It was great though! I'm excited to get to read the rest of the talks in the next Ensign.

We had a busy week working in the sites. It has been wonderful. There is already a feeling of pageant in the air and it is exciting! We had a special training last night about taking bus tours... things are starting to get busy. While we were working at the Hill Cumorah this week President Christianson pulled aside Sister Gines to talk to her for a few minutes. When she came back out Sister Christianson had her arms around Sister Gines and she was crying. Alarmed, I ran over to them and as I walked up President looked at me and said, "I guess you two have more in common then you thought". Her Grandma has terminal cancer. She's not expected to live for more than two more months. It was a tender experience to get to hold my companion in my arms and both weep and grieve together. I have no doubt that we were both suppose to be together, through this part of our lives, to be those tender mercies that the Lord provides, to show of His love. To rely on each other's strength and build our tesimonies, together, of the reality of the Plan of Salvation.

As I was sitting, studying, pondering, meditating, in the Christus room this week I was thinking about some of the lessons that my mission has taught me. One being: how to be alone. It is ironic that I have never talked to more random strangers, I have never talked on the phone so much or have ever had someone attatched to my hip 24/7, and yet, at times, I have never felt so alone. I thought of Dad's favorite song that plays in "Phantom of the Opera" during the end credits, "Learn to be Lonely". As I stared up at the Christus statue I realized that we have to learn to be lonely, to realize that we are never alone. When everything else seems to be disattatched, there is One with "his arm outstretched still". There is always something constant in our lives and that is the love of the Savior. Nothing can ever separate us from Him, whether we be in Utah or New York, whether we be missionaries or investigators, whether we be sinners or saints. He will never leave us. We never have to be alone.

I love all of you so much. I'm so grateful for each one of your silent examples and incredible strength. I draw from your prayers and your memories often. I hope you have an amazing week.

Love always, Sister Carter