I am so blessed to be on my mission!

This week it got was great! 

We had a lot of La/pm we visited. It was cool because two said that they were not supposed to be home, but things got cancelled or they skipped- it was so inspired! 

Our recent convert is on fire! She is amazing! She gave out three Book of Mormons last week and some pass along cards! Her son shared during his recess the Gospel to his friend. They are amazing! And her friend, we have been teaching, came to church! During Relief Society, during the "good news moment", she got emotional as she announced that she had a really spiritual experience that morning as she read a pamphlet we gave her and as she read the scriptures and that she loved us. She is amazing! 

There are so many amazing people I have blessed to meet. So many people go through such hard things, but always trust in the Lord. It was amazing to see how different her countenance was at church, she was so happy and peaceful. 

I am so blessed to be on my mission! I am so blessed to learn more how to rely on the Lord. I know He gives us trials so that we can learn to rely on Him and grow. I know He uses those trials to help us so that later when bigger ones come, we are prepared and can handle it through His help. I know that His Atonement is real. That He Jesus Christ took on all our heart ache and pains, so that He could succor us. 

I am so grateful for you all! 
Love you!

Love Always, Sister McDougle

Forgiving is a principal of power!

My Life is changed. 
My week can be summed up in two things: 

Pumpkin Show and Elder Robins. 

Elder Robbins, a member of the Seventy, came to our stake conference and all the Zone Leaders, District Leaders, and Sister Training leaders got to have a meeting with him. 

Pumpkin Show:

Found out it is the 6th biggest fair in the US or something like that

They have the World's largest pumpkin there (well I don't know if this year broke the previous record they have had or not, but it was BIG)

They have the World's largest pumpkin pie!

The main streets shut down, the schools have school off thursday and Friday for it!

Members took us their for dinner one night (we all shared different stuff) and now I can say I have had: fried pumpkin waffles, fried pumpkin blossom (my favorite, tasted like fried zucchini a little), pumpkin burger, pumpkin fudge, pumpkin doughnut, and pumpkin ice-cream!

We ran into a lot of LA so that was really good. We passed out some cards. Shinning moment- passed out a pass along card to a man in a chicken suit!

WE also had a cool experience where we went to a part-member home for an appointment with a girl, she wasn't there, we left. Later we felt like we should go back. Prayed and went back and got to set up a return appointment with the mom!

Elder Robbins:

Stake conference was amazing! Sister Nilsen talked, and she realized a different folder she had. She just pulled it off amazingly and was definitely inspired. Elder Robbins talked a lot about marriage and then in the meeting talked a lot about agency and responsibility. 

Some notes:

~There is power in the book of Mormon!

~Win a friend instantly by helping them with a problem they have.  

~How did the Lord win your heart? By helping you with 2 gigantic problems, we needed a Savior.

~How many times have you been carried back on the Lord's shoulders?

~It takes some not so perfect days to get to that perfect day

~Nobody can replace the work you individually need to do!

~Only about 25% of the U.S. say the phrase "I love you!"

 in their homes! We need to say it!

~I love you" is a promise of behavior.

~If you were in the Savior's presence you would feel His love and He would express it!

~Our success in life is going from failure to failure without any lose of enthusiasm!

~We need the Sacrament, it allows us to get up again

~"Do you want to be right or be married?"

~Anger-withdraw of love, is only the manifestation of fear.

He taught us theses amazing concepts! He talked about how we have 100% agency and the doctrine that goes with that is Responsibility with 100% agency have 100% responsibility

We are not free because we have chosen, we are free because we have chosen well!

If we choose the wrong road we also choose the wrong destination.

This List is what destroyed Laman and Lemual.

Doubt

Self Justification

Fear 

Blame

Murmur

Laziness

Ignorance

Pride

Running Away

Giving Up

Hide

Rebellion

Lying

Excuses

Complain

Self-pity

Even if they are right champions do not go to this list. 

THE DAY A PERSON CROSSES THIS LIST OUT OF THEIR LIFE IS THE DAY THEY BECOME A CHAMPION.

He taught a lot about agency and responsibility. Basically by blamming others and giving up responsibility we are giving up control. By blamming someone else you give up control on the outcome!

If it is to be, it is up to me.

Responsibility is the courage to face and resolve pain, fear, shame, and guilt.

Assuming responsibility increases our options, blessings, happiness, and control, while blamming, excuses, self-justifying, and self-pity limit our control and freedom. If others are at fault abnd have to change before further progress is made, then others are in control of the outcome or desired results. Agency and responsibility are inseperably connected. You can't avoid one without affecting or loosing the other.

Even if you are right you dont need to blame.

Forgiving is a principle of power and control in your life.

I love you all so much! 

Thank you for all the support, prayers, and Love! I know this gospel is true! I am so grateful for the Savior and his love for us that motivated Him to Atone for us. 

Love you!

-Sister McDougle

I Love General Conference!

This week was great! 

 

We have been meeting a lot with our media referral investigator and he is progressing! He has said how he already sees the change in him. It is awesome!

 For one of the exchanges we did we went to Reynoldsburg. Sister Malloy, my old companion from Greenfield, is now there with Sister Hansen. It was kinda surreal working in my last area Reynoldburg with my old companion from Greenfield. She and Sister Hansen are amazing and it was so great to work with them both again. They are both so awesome! I got to see a less-active we worked a lot with. It was so good to see her. She is amazing i love her! 

She came to general conference with us and President Utchdorf's talk spoke right to her she was saying. It was so amazing to see how she was touched and how Heavenly Father knows his children. 

We went back to our area and watched it at a member's house, and A who was baptized last week was there. The next day we watched it at the chapel. In between a member invited us over for lunch. Then we gave an investigator a Chapel tour. He watched the second session with us. It was amazing how the talks were perfect fro him! I love general conference! Ah so great! I love you all!

Countdown: Who will you help bring closer to Christ before Christmas?

Love, Sister McDougle

121 members present!!!!

This week was great! 

It consisted of a training, 2 exchanges, 3 baptisms, 3 confirmations, and a bunch of other great things! Our zone broke the mission record with 121 member presents!!!!! (The previous goal was like 80 something). It was definitely a miracle. Lots of fasting, prayer, and hard work. We had 8 in our area! It was so great! The members are amazing here! 

One member invited H to go with him to the father son camp out, it meant so much to H and his mom! Another member took H to her house so A could watch the relief society conference! It was amazing. The talks were all on keeping your covenants by serving and the member, in the conference offers to walk h to her house to play with her kids. It was amazing! 

The ward is getting so involved with missionary work it is great! They make all the difference. If it weren't for them fellowshipping, offering rides, and testimonies those 3 baptisms would not have happened. The baptism was so great! The spirit was so strong!

 It was amazing to have 3 baptisms for our ward. It was kinda great to have both sets of missionaries having someone baptized and so many of the members there and involved. That is what is supposed to be like, a group effort. Where everyone is reaching out and being Christ's hands by reaching down and lifting up. 

On Sunday we had the 3 confirmations! It was great! And then H bore his testimony! it was amazing! Sister Dycus and I got to teach real quick in combined priesthood and relief society.  It is so great to see how much hope this gospel brings, the Atonement brings. I know that this is Christ's gospel. That His church and authority has been restored!

 I love you all!

 -Sister McDougle

Angie is Amazing!

Hi! 

This week was great! We had exchanges with 2 sisters. 

I got to work with Sister Hansen and Love again which was really fun and great! 

Broke a HUGE blister- bigger than a quarter that went through3 layers of  skin...like a champ :)

Hunter and Angie had us over for dinner and made us each individual cakes! 

It was soo sweet!

We watched the Testament with them one day, it made me cry when Christ comes. I love how He knows each of us by name.

Angie is amazing! Her baptism is this weekend, so Satan is working hard but she is so amazing and always putting God first! 

Love you all!

They call me Sister Goofball :)

I kinda loudly said, "No Way!"

Hi! 

So Wednesday was a crazy day! It was really hard saying goodbye to people in Reynoldsburg. There are so many amazing people there who were amazing examples to me. 

President Nilsen called on Wednesday to call me as a Sister Training Leader. He said it's like a Zone Leader. Said some hard goodbyes and then packed everything up that night. 

Transfers were crazy! Over 90% of the companionship's in the mission were affected! So, basically most of the mission was there. Also super crazy, a lot of the areas now have Elders and Sisters in the wards/branches. 

They called Sister Training Leaders to be with Sister Training Leaders, kinda like how zone leaders are. So.... I am with... SISTER DYCUS!!!!!! I am back with my mama (Trainer)! When they were announcing our names I was so shocked I kinda loudly said "No Way!" We were stocked! 

I am now serving in the Canal Winchester ward. I am in Circleville. The area is split, so the Elders have Canal Winchester and we have Circleville. We have a big ward, the biggest I have ever served in. There is about 100 active members! In our area though we have about 4 active members. But it's all good, we're working on that! It is a lot like Greenfield. Lots of corn here. It's so different going from the city and suburbs to this area. It's great! It is just super surreal when I look over and see Sister Dycus driving with cornfields all around us, I feel like it's a flashback of 6 months ago. 

We have amazing investigators we are working with! Two are on date! And guess what, the kid we are working with his name is Hunter, just like in Reynoldsburg! He is great! He just turned 8. He calls me Goofball. 

It was such a blessing, because the first Sunday is always a little crazy, it was so cool that I knew some people! A family from Reynoldburg was visiting and one of Sister Love's mini missionaries that we worked with is in that ward. She is awesome! 

Today we had a mission luau. It was so fun! We had a bunch of fun games: volleyball, water-balloon volleyball, corn hole, stick pull, and other stuff. We also had our amazing "King of Tonga", senior couple Elder and Sister Neu, made us a BBQ. It was really fun! 

Tomorrow we have interviews with the President. Sister Dycus and I will be helping train the zones during it. Then Wed is Zone meeting, which we are putting on with the Zone Leaders, and then we have exchanges that day with one of the companionship's, then on Friday with another companionship, and then a really cool Relief Society Fireside on Saturday. At the fireside, Sister Nilsen will be speaking, some of the Amish sisters who recently have been baptized will be speaking, and they are going to have Cafe Rio style food! So excited! 

I love you all! Thank you so much for the support and prayers it means a lot! I love being out here and seeing how the Atonement not only works in others lives but in mine. I know that it is only through Jesus Christ's sacrifice that I can do and be more than I am.

 I love you all!

 

Love Always,

 Sister Mcdougle

I'm being transferred!

Hunter got baptized!!!!! Ah it was so amazing! It was great! He looked so happy! And the next day he got confirmed! He is such an awesome/amazing kid! 

We have also been working with this one less active who has honestly changed all of our lives. He has changed his life around and is working towards going to the temple!! He is such an example to all of us. And he is really awesome because at one point we were talking about donuts and Ohio is different and doesn't have any maple bars that aren't filled!!! Crazy right? Well he is close with the donut people and got me two non-filled donuts. It was amazing and tasted like home :). Also he has been talking to his brother about the church and how he is going back, and his brother has seen all the changes and is open to learning more and we got to teach him the other day!!! He is awesome!

Went on exchanges with Sister Dycus and Pricket. They are great.

On labor day we went park contacting at Blacklick park. It is so gorgeous! I love it! So green and has all these walking trails through the forest that make me think of the sacred grove. Ohio is funny. We went in sweating because it was sooo hot and left running to our car drenched from the pouring buckets of rain. 

Learning about the enabling power of the Atonement. It is life changing! I love it! 

I was invited to go to the leadership council this week. It was so great! I received a lot of amazing training! 

Miracle! So on Sunday we really wanted to find 2 more new investigators. We felt impressed to visit an investigator. So we basically got down to we had 2 hrs left. We prayed for help. The first door we went to we met this great lady who became an investigator, saw members invited them to the follow up lesson, and then I felt impressed to go to this random house. She became an investigator! It was a pure miracle!!! Like that doesn't happen!! Ah! And we did it all in an hour so we had time to go visit the investigator! And the lesson was super cool because we felt impressed to suggest that he reads Proverbs and then the footnotes on it to the Book of Mormon, since he was reading in Proverbs and stuff. He said that when we said that it clicked. It was really cool. Plus he has been going through a hard time so it was really great we got to see him.

Today we had zone day fun day! We played glow in the dark volleyball! We also played normal volleyball, ate spaghetti, and played a game like dodge ball. It was so fun! 

I got the call. I am being transferred and Sister Love and Hansen are staying. I am so grateful to have served here, especially with them. It's cool because we can see how inspired it was to have us together this last transfer. It is really cool. I am so grateful for all the amazing people here. Ah the ward is so great. And I have learned so much from Sister Love and Hansen. They are such amazing missionaries. I love them. So I guess on Monday I will let you know where I am. Love yah all and thank you for all the support!

Love, Sister McDougle