"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