Ether 12:6 has been my theme for the past week. Geez, these trials of our faith are no fun!

Ether 12:6 has been my theme for the past week. Geez, these trials of our faith are no fun! But when you receive that witness AFTER the trial of your faith...it is all worth it. Our mission president gave my companion and I a very specific challenge of some goals he wanted us to meet. So we planned thoroughly and sought a lot of guidance from above as to how we could meet these goals. Boy oh boy, did we work hard this week. Every moment of the day, we were consciously putting forth all our efforts to accomplish these goals! And I was studying faith all week from preach my gospel...coincidence? Nope! haha! But This week taught me a lot. I've never prayed or pleaded so earnestly for help as I did this week. I knew we couldn't do this on our own...we needed divine intervention. After a quite exhausting week, we ended up not meeting our goals. We met one of them, but not all. I thought a lot about this last night and that's when Ether 12:6 came to mind. This is a trial of my faith and I will receive the witness when it's all done. But until then, I gotta keep pressing on! It was a bit frustrating to feel like I did all I could and still didn't meet our goals. Heavenly Father works in mysterious ways though. And I definitely trust His plan over mine. Working hard all week did bring us many small miracles. We were able to meet a lot of wonderful people who welcomed us back next week. And we were able to meet with our investigators and make progress with them as well! 

Our investigator, A, is about to have a baby! We were able to meet with her a few times and she was very open with us about her concerns. Hopefully with this new insight and guidance, we can really help her and her family to progress even more! Our other investigator, S, is soaking in all the lessons. She does have some different beliefs that she said might be a problem, but I totally trust that the Lord and His spirit can change her heart. It's amazing what can happen when the spirit is present. 

So even with our falling short of the goals, we still had a blessed week. The Lord's hand is in just about everything that we do. I love feeling so close to the spirit and seeing how He helps us everyday as we do His work here on earth. I hope you all can see His hand in your lives this week! Cuz I promise you...it's there. 

                                                                         I love you all! xoxo

                                                                                                              Sister Hoer

We had a picnic with our Sis. Missionaries!

We helped out at the Family History Fair... playing dress up! It was super fun!

Our ward mission leaders wife bought these fruit strips for us. So sweet!

This is a fox! We see so much wildlife in Colorado, amazing!

Colorado is treating me well. Except for the 9 inches of snow we got this week. I could do without that!

What a week! Sometimes, I feel like we have so much to do that we don't even get time for good hard work! This week, we had a long meeting in the springs with representatives from the Mission Department. It was quite an amazing meeting. They came to our mission and evaluated what we need to work on to lift our mission and move the work forward. The focus of our training with them was proper planning. They talked all about how if we can involve the Lord in our planning, we will always be effective missionaries. After all, this is the Lord's mission. This is His work. So of course we should involve Him in our planning! I've always looked at planning as more of scheduling...finding things to do that will fill our time with productive activities and lessons. But they talked about taking the time to see the vision, set goals, make a plan, and then schedule it out. We tried this new and very involved way of planning and it made all the difference. It takes time, but we felt so guided by the spirit as we talked about our investigators and what we need to do to take care of our area.

This is the Lord's vineyard and He has assigned us to watch over this part of his vineyard for a time. I love Jacob 5. The Lord repeats many times.... "it grieveth me that I should lose this tree..." that shows just how much the Lord cares about every single one of His children. He doesn't want to lose a single one! And we, as laborers and servants in His vineyard, are working along side Him to make sure none of the trees or branches get lost. This meeting really made me appreciate my mission and the work I get to do here. It's a privilege to be doing the Lord's work! We are participating in the most important work among the face of the Earth...saving human souls. That is something to take seriously! 

I've definitely learned a lot and I'm loving the chance I get to apply what I've learned. Things are going great! And Colorado is treating me well. Except for the 9 inches of snow we got this week. I could do without that. 

Love you all! Have a fantastic week. 

xoxo

Sister Hoer

The 9 inches of snow was a surprise!!!  It's APRIL!  ( My new comp Sis. Hall)

Last p-day, just chillin!

I have a new companion, Sister Hall. She is a peach! Literally. A Georgia Peach. Haha!

Transfers are always a crazy, crazy, crazy, loco week. Especially this transfer because we moved into a new house the day after transfers! It's amazing what random junk missionaries will leave behind. And, we got the pleasure of cleaning out all that random stuff from missionaries over the past year! But it feels so good to be in our new home and the family we live with is wonderful! It really feels like home there. It's a wonderful place for us to live and we're so much closer to all the people that we work with now! (to live in the ward we serve) It's wonderful.

So with such a crazy week, it feels like I hardly had time to breathe. I have a new companion, Sister Hall. She is a peach! Literally. A Georgia Peach. Hahahah! We've had some good times already. I think we'll see some wonderful things happen this transfer! 

I just want to share a short thought on something I read in the Ensign this week. It clarified the difference between sin and weakness. Having weaknesses is something that God has given us to be humble. And because of His grace, we can turn those weaknesses into strengths! Sin is the willful disobedience to God's will. Just because we have a weakness doesn't necessarily mean it's a sin. For example, it's not a sin to be timid. That's something a lot of missionaries struggle with and they beat themselves up for it! But they just need to humble themselves and rely on God to turn that weakness into a strength. We ALL have weaknesses. Hate to break it to ya, but every single one of us have things that we fall short of. But be grateful for those weaknesses because that allows you the opportunity to call upon Christ to become stronger. *2 Corinthians 12:9* Reading this article made me realize that on my mission, I've probably beat myself up about my weaknesses and convinced myself that they are sins! But that is Satan. He is so deceiving. It's so comforting to see how the spirit can bring peace to our souls and especially to help us feel Heavenly Father's love. As I studied the topic of sin vs. weakness, I felt over and over again the overwhelming love that Heavenly Father has for me. And now I can go share that love with everyone in the Pinery. 

I love you all and hope you're having a fantastic week! 

xoxo

Sister Hoer

Sis. Fuchs and I are learning how to play the ukelele!

Having fun on p-day.

We have a band called the Parker Phat Cats!

We live right by this lake. Could life get any better than this!?!  Colorado is gorgeous!

Conference is literally the most wonderful time of year!

Conference is literally the most wonderful time of year! What a blessing it is for us to have living prophets and apostles that can deliver the word of the Lord to us!?!  I love watching conference. It's especially fun here because the members invited us to join them for all their conference traditions! Conference Cinnamon Rolls is a big thing here....

I love what Elder Russell M. Nelson said in his talk.... that we all need to ask ourselves "How will I change because of conference?" I definitely received some divine personal revelation and I know what I need to do in my life at this specific time. But what good will it be to me if I don't actually DO IT?? When King Benjamin got all the people together and they brought their tents to listen to his voice, he went and asked the people afterwards if they believed the words that he spoke. And do you know what they said? They said yes, they believed. But they continued to say that they felt a change in their hearts and they had no more desire to do evil! (Mosiah 2:5) Those people truly let the words of King Benjamin sink into their hearts and then they did something about it. Most of those people were baptized after hearing his words. We may have been baptized already, but what will we do to uphold that covenant we already made? What did the spirit tell us during conference that will help us strengthen our faith? How are we going to come close to Christ? These are things we need to think about to truly get the most out of conference. I sure am excited about the new goals I have set and how this will help me finish strong! The Lord gave us general conference for a reason! It's for us and for our benefit.

And how wonderful was it to have conference on Easter Sunday?? Man, talk about the best weekend ever! I loved talking to everyone about Christ and the infinite impact of His sacrifice. The Atonement is available for all of us. If we just exercise that faith and use it! Robert D. Hales talked a lot about agency. And we need to use that agency and decide to repent! Decide to depend on Christ! Just like Elder Hales said...."Don't walk.... RUN. Run to use your agency!" I could go on all day about the nuggets of knowledge I gained from conference. But overall, I felt a great appreciation for my Savior. For the love He has for every single one of us to give His life for us. And because of Him, we can live again. We can be made clean. I hope we all turned our thoughts to Christ this Easter and thank our Heavenly Father with all our hearts for the miraculous gift of His Son. 

I love my Savior. I know HE LIVES! He is there for all of us...in moments of sadness, regret, sorrow, and sunshine.

I love you all! Have a fantastic week. 

xoxo

Sister Hoer

Our Zone hiked Castle Rock last p-day. So much fun!

Beautiful Colorado day!

We have the coolest zone ever!

My comp & I & ZL's made matching headbands and ties for our zone, #swag.

My district

A few of my mishunary frendz.

We did our studies by this pretty little lake one day. Colorado is gorgeous!

An Easter egg I made.