What are you willing to do?

Boy oh boy was this a good week! 

R is doing super good! This week we had a really cool experience with him. Background on him. He has been attending other churches so for him to come to church he would have to attend the YSA branch which starts at the end of our wards meetings. He came to church last week and thought that it was a cool experience. We taught him about the Plan of Salvation this week! While teaching him about our life on earth we told him that the way to return back to our Heavenly Father was through living the Gospel of Jesus Christ. We asked if he had prayed about his baptism date and he told us that at first he was a little skeptical about it but that he had prayed and that he decided that that would be the best for him. He committed right then to come to church at ten and to not attend any other churches. Then the next time we met with him (I was in a different area for this one) we taught him the second half of the Plan of Salvation. He LOVED the Atonement and told us that he had never heard of it before. Then when talking about the kingdoms of glories he was quoting scripture about it. He is so excited to be baptized and we are so excited for him as well. It is really something that when people decide to get baptized it is because of their own personal witness of Jesus Christ through the Book of Mormon and prayer. We could teach them everything about the church but it would never matter unless they read and prayed about the Book of Mormon. I am so grateful to be able to serve as a full time instrument for the Lord for 18 months. I know that I have been called to declare His gospel but the spirit is the one who  teaches the people, all I need to do is search, ponder, and pray about the scriptures and for the people I am teaching and then show up. The Lord does the rest. 

H is also preparing to be a missionary...oops I meant be baptized. H is super cool. He wants to be a missionary so bad. He has been telling his family about the church and has been reading the Book of Mormon like crazy. He is so prepared to make his first covenant with the Lord.

We have the coolest returning members in the entire province of Ontario. I love them. One super cool person is D. She is a native and was baptized about 45 years ago. Her foster parents in Alberta have been in close contact with us as we have been teaching her about the church. Due to vision complications she can hardly see and will not be able to see for another month until she gets her surgery. But as we were teaching her about the Book of Mormon this week she said, "Oh yeah I read that." We were both confused because we know that she can't read and she continued to tell us that she found a ultra magnifying glass and was reading the Book of Mormon the best she could. My heart bursts with joy as I think of that sweet women doing all she can to understand the gospel of Jesus Christ. So here is the question... What are you willing to do to understand more fully our saviors doctrine? I can't help but think of the Prophet Joseph Smith and all of the saints when I think about people doing all they could to know or live the gospel. The were cast out of every single place that they lived and some were murdered because of their quest to understand. Today we don't have to deal with any of that. Today all we have to do is open an app and read. But do we do it? I am so grateful for Donna and for the example that she is to me of doing all we can to understand. I want to invite everyone here to think of what you would be willing to do to more fully understand the gospel of Jesus Christ. And then I want you invite you to do it! I know that I was deeply called to repentance by the example of all of these faithful members of the church who did all that they could do. They were willing to do it all because they loved their savior.  I have so much that I need to do to improve, and I will do all that I can. I am grateful for my savior. I love him and I know him. 

I hope that you all have a wonderful week! Know that I pray for you. Know that the reason I am on a mission is to help people create eternal families like my own. 

"Here take it."

This week was just too good! 

Monday: This last week I was able to buy two really cute and very needed skirts for only $11!! I was so excited! Who knew thrift shops were so great?! Just kidding Sister Bell taught me that one. ;) We also had Dinner with the cutest lady ever. Her name is Sister C and she has the best Scottish accent. We just love her so much. Then we had a lesson with another member (everyone thought I was leaving the area) Sister Wilson and I while we were planning for her both felt like we should teach about service. As we shared Mosiah 2:17 and thanked her for the service she gives to people she broke into tears. She had been having a really hard time and the message that was shared inspired and encouraged her to change. She then invited us for dinner later that week. 

Tuesday: Today we found a man named H. I was getting on the subway and he laughed and said "Sister!" I smiled and went and talked with him. He is from Uganda and told us that Hakuna Matata started in his home town. I talked with him about prophets and eternal families and then Sister Wilson joined me and he told us that he would love to learn more! We had a couple member appointments and we found a sweet Hungarian family to teach which is super cool because a member of our ward just got back from the Hungary Budapest mission and he is pumped to continue teaching! You go RM! We were able to teach a lesson to one of our returning members about temples and family history work and he was so excited that he told us he wanted to work towards going to the temple to do baptisms for his ancestors. At the end of the lesson the member couple that was teaching with us told him that he didn't have to introduce his friends to the church but that he could introduce them to Family history! We love the  couple. We were excited to see them bear solid testimony of the Plan of Salvation especially because she is a new convert and he just recently reactivated! We also were able to teach one of the students in our English class how to pray and since that lesson she has met several times with the mandarin missionaries. 

Wednesday: Oh man! We taught so much today! We were able to teach a couple new investigators about the Restoration. We had a wonderful chapel tour lesson with our investigator R. He was found through the YSA sisters, I am so grateful for them opening their mouth. :) He is sweet and he felt the spirit as we talked about the Sacrament in the chapel. He is committed to baptism in May! We had this awesome five course meal with the Relief Society. It is always fun to eat there because she is from the Philippines so I feel like I am in Elder Kelley's mission. :) There was a lot of left over food so Sister Wilson carried it to the next lesson which was another lesson with another Filipino family. They also gave us a ton of food so I got to carry home food as well!

Thursday: We had the coolest lesson today with one of our investigators N. He usually doesn't pray but after hearing about the gospel of Jesus Christ in 3 Nephi 11 he couldn't help but solidly commit to pray. The member that was with us at that lesson was super helpful. She answered so many of his questions. I don't think the lesson could have gone so well without her. We had dinner with the same member that we met with on Monday night. She fed us super good Afghan food. At the end of the dinner we were talking about the Book of Mormon she told us that she wanted to give a Book of Mormon to a co-worker. She role played with us and she was so powerful as she bore her testimony to her friend. Something super cool is that Sister Wilson and I felt like we should commit her to write her testimony in the Book of Mormon and give it to someone and as we were at her house she brought it up herself. I never cease to be amazed at the way the spirit works. We had another member that day feel like she should give a Book of Mormon to her co-worker as well! Super cool eh? 

The Weekend (because this email is long and I bet none of you actually read it) We contacted so many people this weekend. We were able to get into houses that I haven't been able to my entire time being here! We also received lots of referrals. One of the referrals we got was after our lesson with N. He told us that his friend would be super interested in learning and when we asked him if he would like to invite her to the next lesson he said, "No, just shoot a text." Sister Wilson and I secretly laughed about it because usually they invite their friends but this time he just gave us all of her information! And guess what? we have an appointment with her! N also took us out to a really good sushi restaurant and while we were there he talked about the District movies and asked us if there were more seasons and he talked about Preach My Gospel.. Pretty much we don't need to teach him anything because he already knows it all. We saw so many other miracles but. I don't want to take away your entire day... 

While we were walking out of lessons people were stopping us and asking us to come visit them. Literally everywhere we went people knew that we were the missionaries. We had probably over 1000 people ask us if we were twins. We also were talking to people in an area we call mini Slovakia and one of the people we were talking too decided to Skype there family because they thought that we were cool. So Sister Wilson and I were preaching the gospel all over the world this week. :) 

I am so grateful for the members who love being missionaries. Every lesson that we had a member at the person progressed. Specifically with R. The ward missionary that came told him so many important things while we were on the chapel tour and when we met with him again he gave him a ride and now they text each other. I am so grateful for the faithful members in the Don Mills ward!

To top off this perfect film ready week... we have a story...

We were making calls while sitting outside in the beautiful  sun and this man walked up to us extended his arm and said....."Here take it." We saw a $10 bill in his hand and in shock replied by saying "Sorry?" He gave us the money and walked away. Sister Wilson and I were so confused but took and today we are going to give it to a homeless person. So there you have it. BEST WEEK EVER. 

I love you all! Have a great week!

An Update from Canada

I am staying in Toronto! YAY! This will be the area I will serve the longest in. I love this ward and this area and I am excited to labor here for at least another six weeks. 

This week was a really crazy week for Sister Wilson and I. We hadn't had much time to find new investigators because of appointments and meetings so we knew that yesterday we were going to have to do all that we could and more to find people to teach. While we were getting ready to leave church a family walked in. Some all sisters who are  going home this week started talking to them and quickly called us over to talk with them. We asked them all their ages and they were all above 8! Sister Wilson and I showed them around the church and talked about the sacrament in the chapel.  As we were asking them if they would be interested in learning more they kindly told us that their mom did not speak very much English and that they didn't have a number for us to contact them at. We gave them our card and told them to come to church next week. As we were leaving my wonderful companion Sister Wilson said that we should run after them and give them a Book of Mormon and get their address. We did and as we talked with them we were able to find out where they lived and set up an appointment to teach them. I am so grateful for Heavenly Father constantly placing people in our path who are ready to hear the gospel. What makes this situation better was that the people in the family was the exact number of people we had planned to find that week. 

I love family history! In MLC this month we were instructed by President and Sister Clayton on how to teach temples and family history more simply and clearly so our investigators can understand the doctrines and gain the desire to do it. I loved it. It all made so much sense as we connected point to point of restored truth. After the meeting the Zone Leaders asked Sister Wilson and I to instruct the zone on the exact topic the next day. As Sister Wilson and I role played we found out that the new way to teach wasn't as easy as we thought it would be. We continued to choke on our words and had a hard time teaching in unity. But we continued to practice. When we instructed everything ran smoothly. I am so grateful for practicing things to become better. I remember in grade 9 a teacher told me that I was shooting a basketball wrong. I of course was to prideful to admit it but when I tried to do it the other way I became a little better at shooting. I have seen how practicing simple things over and over and over has been able to help me see a better and successful outcome. I think the same principles can be applied for daily prayer and scripture study. As we begin it may be hard, but as we continue we will be able to receive a better outcome. I know that daily scripture study and prayer is what allows us to joyfully endure to the end. I wanted to invite everyone who reads this to take time and make a plan about how you can become better at practicing daily prayer and scripture study. Then I want to invite you to do it! I know that as you take that time you will be able to be at peace. Every on of you has something different going on in your life but the gospel is what we all need and the gospel is taught in scriptures and understood in prayer. I love you all! I hope you have a great week! 

An Update from Canada

What a wonderful wonderful weekend. I am so grateful for our dear prophet, Thomas S. Monson. His talk was amazing. Something that stuck with me from his talk was the phrase, "make the harder right or the easier wrong." I wonder how often we make the easier wrong. Many times we were reminding about our eternal destiny and potential. Our agency is key to that and we need to do things that are hard to get there. I love my prophet.

This week was such a crazy week!! We were able to invite so many people to come to General Conference and we taught so many wonderful people about Christs restored gospel. :) A couple weeks ago Sister Wilson and I were walking hanging up ESL flyers when Sister Wilson tried to talk to a girl with earphones in. She didn't pay attention due to her loud music but finally we got her attention. We told her about a living prophet and told her we would love to share a message with her. She said yes and we met with her early last week. C was running a bit behind and Sister Wilson and I decided to wait just a bit longer to see if she would come. SHE DID! We taught her about the Restoration and though it is simply it powerfully touched her heart. She told us that she had gone to her original church last week for the first time in a long time. She said that she could feel something and that when we taught her about the Restoration she felt it again. I am so grateful for the spirit. She accepted our invitation to be baptized but told us that she would soon be moving back to London. We are going to continue to teach her for a week then we will pass her onto the London YSA sisters. I am so grateful for experiences like this where I can feel the spirit working through me to teach God's children. The Gospel is true. 

I love you all. I hope that you all have a great week. This next Sunday is transfer calls! 

Easter

This week was an awesome week! Easter is always amazing on the mission! Well, this morning Sister Wilson and I ran around like crazy women trying to find a library to email at. I don't have anytime to write a big email to you all, but I love you! 

Have a good week and remember to read and pray! 

Canada

Wow. Looking at the emails I received from some of you this week. I have the prettiest little Sister in the entire world. :) I love you N. I am so excited for you!

This week was really adventurous. I was so sick this week. I had this really terrible cold that had me coughing all day. One day was so bad that Sister Wilson made me go home and sleep for an hour. I was so grateful! That same day when we got home to plan I told her before  going to bed that it was the hardest day I had ever had on my mission, physically that is. I was so exhausted all day and the coughing and caused me to have s many pains that it was really hard to talk with people on the bus. But, I did anyways and if it comes up on the new that Toronto had broken out into sudden sickness it is because sometimes you just can't help but sneeze or cough on someone! haha


Family History is where it is at! This week Sister Wilson and I got to help a young womens group learn how to do family history. About two weeks ago we had to use the church family history centre for an instruction we would be giving. As we went in there we started to talk a little about the volunteers family trees. After talking for a little about it I asked them if I could sing them the Family History song I once learned in Primary. After singing I told them about how much I love Family History work and how much my family loves it as well. I told them about our family history room, "Earl", and all of the wonderful genealogists my family has. They were ecstatic! They asked if we would come back and help them out. While we were there we were able to help this really cute 13 year old girl. She and her mom and had done so much work to be able to enter in the family information easily. After they had imputed a few names we told them about adding stories or memories to an ancestors name. They were so excited to put in stories about their grandparents. "I have records of my loved ones on my own family tree!"

One of our part member families we are working with brought up the desire to do family history work. When we went for dinner  this last week we brought them a My Family book and challenged them to get started on it. A, the investigator, told us that she wants to come to the family history centre to start finding her family. A hasn't been progressing very fast. But Sister Wilson and I are excited to help A and S start to progress as they feel the spirit. They aren't currently married, they have been living common law for about 11 years now. They don't see the need for a "paper" that says they are married. We are excited to teach them more about temple work and how they can be sealed together and with all of their recently found family. "I am yours and you are mine now, for all eternity."

M: Here it goes. This week we taught M about the Word of Wisdom. The lesson was not the greatest lesson ( I studied Chapter 10 in PMG the entire week after that lesson haha), but she committed to start to cut back on her coffee. As we were getting ready to leave she asked a question about the Law of Chastity. We left her a pamphlet and scriptures to read so we could talk about it the next time we visited. Just two days ago we got a text from M telling us that she didn't want to continue to study with the Mormon religion. She told us that she wasn't ready to "conform" to the rules. :( MY HEART BROKE! 💔 We tried to talk to her about meeting with us one final time so we could clear about questions and concerns that she had, but she has never replied. As I stated previously I was really heart broken about the decision that she made to discontinue our meetings. But I learned so many important things from this experience.
"Your success as a missionary is measured primarily by your commitment to find, teach, baptize, and confirm people and to help them become faithful members of the church who enjoy the presence of the Holy Ghost." (Preach my Gospel, Chapter One, Successful Missionary.) Sister Wilson and I pray every single day that we will be able to find future converts. The title of a convert is important. What does in mean to be truly converted? It means that we live the Gospel of Jesus Christ, faithfully and fully. In the Canada Toronto Mission we baptize converts. :) Although M was not baptized at this  time that does not mean that we are not successful missionaries. It means that we learned, she learned, and all of us can and will become better because of the experiences we had.
She is an incredible mother. She loves her children and has taught them so much. It seems to be a silly thing to say I learned from her but I honestly respect her as a mother and I hope that I will someday be able to show that much love to the children I have!
I have a faith filled companion who does not shut down or turn away when things get hard. Sister Wilson is such an amazing example of a diligent missionary. She studies so hard for the people that we teach and she always knows what we need to share with our investigators to help them. While teaching M I was always able to feel the power that comes from having Charity. Sister Wilson is a Christ-Like missionary. Christ-Like, isn't that a great word? She is like a savior Jesus Christ. I love her and I am so grateful to be her companion.
Something really cool happened this week. Sister Wilson and I were walking to the church and we saw this man sitting outside the church. When I first got to Toronto we saw the same man sitting outside the church. The first day here in Toronto Sister Jensen and another missionary went over and talked to him. They found out that his name was S and they shared a card with him. Four months later Sister Wilson and I go over and address him by name and start talking with him. He tells us about his family and occupation. He asks about Jesus Christ and God and we answer his simple but oh so profound questions. He told us that he just doesn't know if Jesus Christ was the son of God. At this exact moment in the conversation the spirit whispered to me instructions that were specific and so plain that I could not misunderstand. I obeyed, and said, "S. Look at me straight in the eyes. (he did) S, I know that Jesus Christ is my savior and your savior. God is our father. He knows each of us personally. We want to teach you how following Jesus Christ will give you a new life. Can we teach you about your Savior?" At that moment I felt the spirit re-testify to me that Jesus Christ is the son of God. S agreed to meet with us to learn more. I want you all to know the exact same thing. I know Jesus Christ is your savior and mine.

This Wednesday I have been in Canada for an entire year?! Last night at a dinner appointment I was telling a member about how I felt when I got here. I remember the pilot announce that we had just crossed from the United States of America to Canada. I looked out the window and realized that my prayers to ask if I should serve a mission were slim to almost non-existent. I had never really received an answer that I should serve, I just chose to come. At that moment I was so nervous. I didn't know what to expect for my next 18 months as  missionary and I didn't know what to think about the new country I had just entered into. I then realized that I had already made my decision and that I was where I should be. Now more than ever I know that I am supposed to be serving a mission in Canada. I love the Canadian people who have won my heart, I love them so much. :) I am grateful to be serving in Toronto!


I love you all so much! Have a great week

--Sister Chelson 

I wish I had more time sometimes!

Sister Wilson and I saw many many miracles this last week. 

The first miracle happened while I was on exchanges with a new missionary! Sister Holmstead has been out for four weeks now and she is a phenomenal missionary. I was blown away by her teaching skills. All of the sisters I exchange with teach me so much. She had never contacted on a bus or a subway before so I told her for the first little bit she could watch how I did it and then she could go and find what worked best for her. After watching me contact TWICE she went off and contacted so many people. One of the people she contacted was super interested in coming  to church. She waved me over to tell her where the church was and after talking for a little bit and finding out that she was getting off at the same stop as us we asked if we could teach her. We taught her the Restoration and invited her to be baptized! I was so grateful for Sister Holmstead and the example she is to always open her mouth. She is going to see so many miracles as she continues to do that.

The next miracle that we had was also from Sister Holmstead and I opening our mouth. The next day a man named H called and told us that he wanted to learn more about the church. We met with him twice this week and invited them to be baptized. They are from Nazareth and love Jesus Christ. It was super cool!

We had a district meeting this week on prayer. Sister Wilson and I were able to teach a really cool lesson to this man named M. A couple weeks ago we met him on the bus. Sister Jensen was getting screamed at by some man and I was talking with M. M thought it was cool that even though we get yelled at we still continue to teach. At the time M didn't have a phone and had no way of meeting with us. I gave him a card so he could call us when he had a phone and he DID!!!!! We taught him about prayer and it was exactly what he needed. We asked similar questions to the role play that we had in district meeting and left the same commitments. He is going to be baptized. 

I wish I had more time but I don't! There were many other miracles seen, and don't worry mom I have recorded all of them in my journal in detail. I love you all and I hope you have a wonderful week! 

Shout out to N who is participating  in the DYW program. I am so proud of you. I love you and I hope you know that no matter what I am so proud of you! You are in my prayers.