Half way mark

Dear all,
This week I hit my 1/2 way point in the mission. It's pretty crazy! On
Thursday we had another lesson with Debbie who was our tracting
miracle from last week! We taught the plan of salvation and she told
us that she wanted to feel that peace all of the time. We testified of
the Spirit and the love Heavenly Father had for her. She got emotional
when we talked about living with our families forever and seeing loved
ones again because her cousin had just passed away the week before.
She works at a summer camp for kids that have disabilities and they go
do fun activities. It's just like the ARC of tri cities back home. She
wasn't able to come to church this week, but hopefully next week she
can come.
On Friday we finally got to have our interviews with President and
Sister Johnson! I had mine at the very beginning of last transfer and
the very end of this transfer, so it had been a long time. I love my
mission President and his wife. They are incredible people. Our
interviews were at the stake center which is in Annapolis and so
trying to get home over the Bay bridge on a Friday night made a 30
minute drive turn into a two hour drive home. Speaking of Annapolis;
every week for our district meeting we drive over to Annapolis and to
get here we have to drive right across the water from the Naval
Academy. It is such a pretty view looking over the water.
On Saturday we traveled to Easton for the day to visit people and
tract. We first stopped at Joyce's house. She is someone who requested
a copy of the Book of Mormon online at Mormon.org a couple of weeks
ago. We walked in and she was sitting on the couch pretty sad. She
told us that her boyfriend had a huge seizure that morning and had
died. We had planned on teaching the Plan of Salvation when we went
over there and she said she still would like to hear what we were
coming to talk about. I really felt the Spirit sitting there with her.
While we were in Easton, we got a text saying that both speakers
cancelled and so we were going to give talks the next day. We got back
late that night and had branch council first thing in the morning so I
didn't feel very prepared for it. Our topic was on obedience and so
luckily there was a lot we could talk on. But I enjoyed giving it.
This week is Elder Boren's 70th birthday and so all of the branch hid
in the kitchen to surprise him at the end of church. We told elder
Boren that we "had a problem with our car and needed him to look at
it" and then came back inside for the surprise. He loved it.
Something that sister Rees and I decided to do two weeks ago was to
memorize The Living Christ. We finally finished this week and it has
been a really great experience for the both of us. At first I was
memorizing it just to memorize it, but once I started really focusing
on the meaning and what it was testifying of, it was a lot more
powerful and easier to memorize. My two favorite paragraphs are the
first and last.
"As we commemorate the birth of Jesus Christ two millennia ago, we
offer our testimony of the reality of His matchless life and the
infinite virtue of His great atoning sacrifice. None other has had so
profound an influence upon all who have lived and will yet live upon
the earth.
We bear testimony, as His duly ordained Apostles--that Jesus is the
Living Christ, the immortal Son of God. He is the great King Immanuel,
who stands today on the right hand of His Father. He is the light, the
life, and the hope of the world. His way is the path that leads to
happiness in this life and eternal life in the world to come. God be
thanked for the matchless gift of His divine Son". I am so grateful
for our Savior and the example and life that He gave to us so freely.
Have a great week!!!
Love Sister Haertling

June 19th

Dear all,
We were able to have a general authority come speak to our mission
this week. His name is Elder Bent H. Nielson and he and his wife spoke
to us at the visitors center. I have really been looking forward to
that. He is the executive director of the missionary department and
spoke to us for 4 hours. There are so many amazing things that he said
but really what I remember he most is how strongly I felt the spirit
and knew that this is where I'm supposed to be right now and that this
gospel of Jesus Christ that has been restored is true. One of the
things that hit me was talking about our purpose here on earth.
Growing up we are asked in primary and young women's and Sunday
school, "what is our purpose here?". And we answer, "to obtain a body
and to be tried and tested". We all know that, but why is it, that
when a trial comes into our lives we ask, "why is this happening to
me?" Or "I'm doing everything right that I should be, so why am I
having such a hard time?". I know that I have asked that a lot. But
like I said before, that is our whole purpose here on earth. It's not
always easy, but that is how Heavenly Father is helping us become the
person He wants us to become. Elder Bednar gave a talk called Bear up
their Burdens with Ease, and he says, "Sometimes we mistakenly may
believe that happiness is the absence of a load. But bearing a load is
a necessary and essential part of the plan of happiness". Joseph smith
is an amazing example of what elder Bednar is talking about. In
Doctrine and Covenants 126 Joseph Smith says, "And as for the perils
which I am called to pass through, they seem but a small thing to me,
as the envy and wrath of man have been my common lot all the days of
my life; and for what cause it seems mysterious, unless I was ordained
from before the foundation of the world for some good end, or bad, as
you may choose to call it. Judge ye for yourselves. God knoweth all
these things, whether it be good or bad. But nevertheless, deep water
is what I am wont to swim in. It all has become a second nature to me;
and I feel, like Paul, to glory in tribulation; for to this day has
the God of my fathers delivered me out of them all, and will deliver
me from henceforth; for behold, and lo, I shall triumph over all my
enemies, for the Lord God hath spoken it". I don't know if I will ever
be able to say that "deep water is what I am won't to swim in", but my
perspective on challenges in life has definitely changed. The last
quote that I loved when studying this talk in preparation for Elder
Nielson says, "As we are yoked with our Savior through sacred
covenants and receive the enabling power of His Atonement in our
lives, we increasingly will seek to understand and live according to
His will. We also will pray for the strength to learn from, change, or
accept our circumstances rather than praying relentlessly for God to
change our circumstances according to our will. We will become agents
who act rather than objects that are acted upon". I have really been
trying to work on that lately. It really works! Instead of praying for
something to change or to take away hard situations, I've been praying
for the strength to get through it.
So Elder Nielsen was coming in the morning to speak with us and we
needed to be there sitting down by 7:15. Since Kent Island is the
furthest area in the mission and we would've had to get up in the dark
and drive over early in the morning President Johnson told us to drive
the night before and stay with some VC sisters. We got there the night
before, got a parking pass for the parking garage, visited with the
sisters who we have missed so much, and went to bed. We came down to
leave for the meeting and when we went out to the parking garage our
car was gone....luckily the sisters hadn't left yet and we got a ride,
but we couldn't be late for this meeting. So the whole time I was
praying and praying that our car would somehow be there when we got
back. And then I realized I was falling back into the same thing I was
working on not doing! So I started praying that I wouldn't be as
stressed out and that we could figure things out smoothly after the
meeting. We figured out afterwards that the lady who wrote our pass at
the apartment wrote it wrong and our car had been towed. Sooooo we
went with elder and sister Thompson to the towing place and got our
car to make it back to Kent Island. It was quite the day.
Yesterday we had such a cool tracting miracle!! We knocked on a door
and a lady named Debbie answered. She was pretty nice and did the
usual at her door talking about why we were there. She asked us to
come in and ended up getting to teach her the whole first lesson! That
hasn't happened to us with someone who is actually curious all
transfer. We both felt really prompted to ask her if she came to know
that the things we talked about are true that she would be baptized
and she said yes with no hesitation! She said at she hasn't been very
good lately about reading the scriptures or going to church and has
been jumping around different churches. She also said that she had
never heard this before and felt so much peace. She gave us both hugs
after we said a prayer together and we are going back on Wednesday.
She is definitely prepared!
We've been able to keep helping Australia and her husband who are
elderly with their back yard. We finished cleaning and painting her
picnic table and benches and are working on her back steps. She is
really sweet and hopefully it will impact her. Thank you for all of
your prayers and support. It really means so much to me! Have a great
week!
Love Sister Haertling

June 12th letter

Dear all, 

Well this week started off pretty crazy! So last Pday we moved into our new apartment, which took most of the day. We ran down to find wifi somewhere and wrote our weekly letters. Then we went back upstairs to get ready for the day and clean a little bit before 6 (when Pday ends). We ran back up to our apartment and I was just looking through boxes when Sister Rees goes, "geez I have this bump on my neck and it feels weird". I didn't really say much about it because we both thought it was a little pimple or something. Then she said something about it again, so I told her to flip her head over since it was in her hair. She leaned over and I saw a black bug that wouldn't move...so I stayed calm and told her I had to go get tweezers and not to move. Of course she started freaking out and I was too. Well I told her it was a tick and called our mission doctor to ask how I should pull it out, cause I didn't want to only get half of it out. I won't go into detail cause it was kinda gross, but I got it out and had it in my little tweezers. Meanwhile I was running around on the phone trying to find a baggie to put it in because our mission doctor wanted a picture of it. I hung up the phone, went to go ask sister Rees-who was still sitting down freaking out and not wanting to move- where she put the ziplock bags. She was brave enough finally and said she wanted to see what it looked like. I held out the tweezers to show her and realized the tick wasnt there anymore.... then we both started screaming walking around on our tippy toes trying to find this tick. After an hour of searching we still couldn't find him. We prayed pretty much the whole week that we would find Arnold (that's what we named him). We were so paranoid that we didn't sleep well for about 4 days because we kept worrying he was on us somewhere haha! We are pretty sure he either died or ran away somewhere. So that is how our week started off! Later that night after 6 we went out to a member's house because they had a group of older people staying with them from Taiwan. They grew up together as kids (the member's dad was one of those kids over 50 years ago in Taiwan) and none of them are members of the church. They all speak Chinese and since Sister Rees speaks Chinese and her mom is from Taiwan, it was perfect! The members own a huge golf course out in the country and have a little restaurant with a big area where you can dance and so they all performed music and dancing and plays for us and loved talking to sister Rees and I about our missions. Then they taught us all some fun line dances. It was such a fun night being surrounded by their culture. 

We have been working with a man named Andy recently! We met him while we were tracting and at first he wasn't too interested. But we invited him to read some of the Book of Mormon and when we came back he had read the chapter we gave him! That was exciting. We taught him the restoration out on his porch and he said it was a little bit hard to accept right now, but he could see himself believing in it if he found out for himself. Also we met an older couple, Australia and Herbert. We met them a couple of weeks ago but Herbert said to come back when his wife was home. So we stopped by a couple of days ago and asked if there was any service that we could do for them. She took us around to the back of her house and showed us her back patio that was in really bad condition. She said that she couldn't lift any of the furniture and it needed to be sprayed down and painted. So we are going back over tomorrow to do that for her! We are really excited for that. 

Another cool experience I've had since being here has to do with a recent convert that was baptized about a year ago. His name is Vince and he is an older man who is one of the nicest people ever! I knew he looked familiar when I got here but I didn't know where I knew him from. We were having a lesson with him last week with the Borens and the topic of patriarchal blessings got brought up because he just got his. I was sharing an experience and afterwards he comments, "you know I really appreciate you talking to me about patriarchal blessings at the visitors center back in December. You were the first person to tell me about them and I'm so grateful I got mine". I kind of sat there for a second and then I remembered how I knew him. He came into the visitors center one morning in December and I thought one of the sisters had already talked to him, but decided to go talk to him anyways. He told me about his conversion and that he was going through a rough time. I remember having a strong impression as we were standing next to the temple model to ask him if he had received his patriarchal blessing yet. He said that he hadn't, and that he didn't know what that was. I remember talking for a while with him. That's all I remember from it, but it was just so cool to see the effect of following a prompting! I'm so thankful that we have the Spirit to guide us. 

On Saturday we made a trip to Easton which is about 35 minutes from here. A couple members of the branch live there and also we had received names of 6 people who were wanting a free copy of the Bible or a missionary visit. So we were excited to go meet all of these people. It was the hottest day of the week, 97 degrees and high humidity, but we ended up talking to over 60 people that day, 7 of those people wanted us to come back into their home and we were able to give out 8 Book of Mormon's! We had been fasting that day and I love it because it seems like miracles always happen those days we fast even when it's hard. The people in Easton are so prepared and we are excited to meet with all of them this week. 

Something that I loveeee here are the fireflies! I've never seen so many of them. Last night when we were finishing up tracting they were everywhere. It's so cool catching them in your hands and seeing them light up. While we were driving home, we were driving past lots of fields and if you looked out you could see them glowing everywhere! 

So this week I was reading in 2 Nephi 19...which can be hard for me to understand sometimes, but I loved this quote by Elder Holland describing the Savior. 

"As noted by Isaiah, Christ is not only a mediator but also a judge. It is in that role of judge that we may find even greater meaning in Abinadi’s repeated expression that ‘God himself’ will come down to redeem his people. It is as if the judge in that great courtroom in heaven, unwilling to ask anyone but himself to bear the burdens of the guilty people standing in the dock, takes off his judicial robes and comes down to earth to bear their stripes personally. Christ as merciful judge is as beautiful and wonderful a concept as that of Christ as counselor, mediator, and advocate.

“‘Mighty God’ conveys something of the power of God, his strength, omnipotence, and unconquerable influence. Isaiah sees him as always able to overcome the effects of sin and transgression in his people and to triumph forever over the would-be oppressors of the children of Israel." 

I have so much to be grateful for because of the Savior and the sacrifice He gave for me to live and return back to our Heavenly Father. I love you all! 

Love, Sister Haertling 

June 5

Dear all, 

This week flew by! I can't believe it's Monday again. We had zone Conference this week, which is always AMAZING. The topic we were asked to prepare was on the importance of prayer. My favorite talk that I read was called, "Improving Your Personal Prayers" by Elder Kevin W. Pearson. The first question he starts with is, "What would listening to your personal prayers reveal about you and your relationship with Heavenly Father?". That really made me stop and think about what my prayers are like. Elder Pearson then says, "Prayer is an essential and enabling spiritual link between God and man. Without prayer, there is no possible return to the Father. Without prayer, sufficient faith to understand and keep the commandments is impossible. Without prayer, the necessary spiritual power to avoid temptation and overcome trials and adversity would be unavailable. Without prayer, repentance, forgiveness and the cleansing power of the Atonement are unattainable. With the power of personal prayer, all things are possible." I had never thought about prayer that way. I knew it was important, but I didn't realize that without it, there would be no way possible to return back to Heavenly Father. The part of his quote that really made me think was this, "Prayer is not a negotiation process. It is an alignment process. We don’t move God to our point of view. Prayer is less about changing our circumstances and more about changing us". Yesterday we had a really cool experience with prayer, even though it didn't get answered immediately. So sister Rees and I were driving down the road. On one side was a huge field, and on the other side were trees and bushes and grass. While we were driving to an appointment I saw a couple looking around in the weeds off to the side. I had the thought to pull over but we were on our way to an appointment that we didn't want to be late for. The appointment didn't end up being home, so we made our way back to tract a neighborhood near there. We drove by and the couple was still looking for something. I pulled over and asked what they were looking for. She said it was her wedding ring. I asked her how she lost it and she said that she had been twirling it around on her finger, then she and her husband got in an argument and she got mad and threw it out. She was really embarrassed and was about to cry. So we started looking and they kept thanking us over and over. We had been looking for about 20 minutes and I told them about an experience that I had when I lost something, said a prayer and was able to find it. So we all said a prayer together and started looking. It was literally finding a needle in a haystack...except worse because there were ticks and HUGE spiders and ants everywhere. They asked us where we went to church and said how they wanted to have more friends like us (they were younger). We invited them to church and they said that they would come. We didn't end up finding her ring that night, but we exchanged numbers and want us to come by this week. The whole time I was praying that we could find it, almost to just show her that Heavenly Father does answer prayers, but that quote kept coming to my head about how prayer isn't a negotiation process and how it is in His timing. Then when they walked off sister Rees and I were walking the opposite direction and I didn't see that I had stepped in a huge ant pile....so my whole foot was covered in ants and were crawling up my leg. Luckily the people had gotten in their car and had driven away because I started screaming and hitting them off as fast as I could. I got them off before they could bite me very much. Sister Rees and I were laughing about it for the rest of the night. Today we finally moved to the island!!!! We have been living in Pasadena about 40 minutes away but we are finally here. It feels so great to live in our area. Usually when you move to a different apartment, you just pack all of your things in your suitcase and leave...but since they were closing this apartment down and opening up a new one, we had to bring every piece of furniture with us and deep clean the old apartment. So today was a long day! Our new apartment is just down the street from the chapel which is nice. While we were moving in a man in our ward, Brother Stamps came over unexpectedly to help move. He is older, and had a stroke a couple of years ago and so his left side of his body doesn't really function. He couldn't really do much, but he helped open the doors for us and the senior couple that was helping us. It was so sweet of him. We both could tell he felt so bad that he couldn't help out very much, but it was so thoughtful of him to come over without us even telling him or his wife. 

We are continuing to work with Zach who is 11 years old and visiting with his mom. She has been to church every week now which is so great! We met a lady named Pam while we were tracting yesterday. She has a couple of nieces who are members of the church and let us in to talk to her. She has a HUGE cat named magic and lives alone. She talked to us for about a half an hour and told us that we could come back. We aren't so sure about how interested she is, but we had a great discussion with her. We have also been working with multiple families who haven't been active for a long time. One of them came to church this week which was exciting! There is so much to do here in this branch and it is amazing to see all of the members working so hard together. Sorry I don't have much time to write this week! I love you all! 

Love, Sister Haertling 

Week 2 on the island

Dear all,
Kent Island just keeps getting better and better! This branch is just
so amazing and impresses me more every week. On Wednesday we got to go
down near the Naval academy on our way to Kent Island and do a
service/finding activity with our district. Every year right before
graduation for the naval academy they have the Blue Angles show, which
is like the F-15's (Idk if that's what they are called back at home I
can't remember) right before the boat races. We all bought a case of
water bottles and put Mormon.org cards on them. Thousands of people
come and sit across the river at the WWII memorial on a green field
and watch the air show. So we all handed out free water bottles and
talked to people. It was a really fun way to talk to people. On
Thursday we got to go on exchanges with the sister training leaders.
It's always a great experience learning from other missionaries and
getting ideas on how to be better. On Friday we got to have a lesson
with the Moore family. Sister Moore hasn't been to church very much
and all of her kids are older in their teens. They have showed a lot
of interest in the church and want to be baptized! There are five of
them and it has been really amazing seeing how they want this for
themselves. Another family that we have been working with is the
Mellors. Sister Mellor grew up on Utah, but hasn't been to church very
much since she moved out here 15 years ago. She is so fun to be
around. Her son Zack who is 11 has showed interest and comes to church
every week, we had a lesson with them on Saturday and he wants to be
baptized. Sister Mellors husband isn't a member, but is really
supportive and said he would come to church. There are so many
exciting things happening in this branch lately. I feel really lucky
to be serving here. On Sunday, sister Rees and I were able to give
talks. Sister Rees talked about the Restoration and I talked about the
plan of Salvation. We didn't have a lot of time to prepare and so I
was really nervous that it wasn't going to come out right. Usually I
read my talks while I speak and I've been trying to get out of that
habit. One of my goals being on a mission is to be able to give a talk
only using bullet point notes. Sister Rees and I had been fasting and
one of the things I prayed and fasted for was for me to be able to
rely on the spirit and feel comfortable giving a talk and not to read
it. I got up to speak and felt so confident! I sat down and realized
that I hardly looked at my notes except to read the scriptures and one
quote that I had. I'm not saying this to make myself sound better, but
I'm saying this because I know that the Holy Ghost is real and
Heavenly Father will give us the strength that we need if we are
sincere and ask Him. One thing that I shared in my talk was a story
from "Your 4 Minutes". It is the story about Noelle who competed in
the Olympics for the skeleton. It talked about how years of practice
would come down to four 60 second races. One of my favorite quotes is,
"Now, consider how your pathway to eternal life is similar to these
athletes’ “four-minute performance.” You are an eternal being. Before
you were born, you existed as a spirit. In the presence of a loving
Heavenly Father, you trained and prepared to come to earth for a brief
moment and, well, perform. This life is your four minutes. While you
are here, your actions will determine whether you win the prize of
eternal life. The prophet Amulek described, “This life is the time …
to prepare to meet God; yea, behold the day of this life is the day …
to perform [your] labors.” In a sense, your four minutes have already
begun. The clock is ticking. The words of the Apostle Paul seem so
fitting: to run the race, that you may obtain the prize."
I know that there is a Plan for each one of us because we have a
loving Heavenly Father who wants us to return to Him. The only way
that this is possible is through our Savior Jesus Christ. I am so
grateful for Him. I know that Heavenly Father also is aware of each
one of us. I love you all!!!!
Love, Sister Haertling