Spain…I love you!

Monday…December 1st, 2014

Here I go. I can´t believe that this will be my last email that I will send to you as a full time missionary of the Lord! 

SPAIN HAS BEEN OH SO GOOD TO ME

My eyes get all teary and I get a lump in my throat as I try and type this last email to my family and friends whom I love so dearly. I hope that I am able to express what I feel. 

I came across the best scripture that fits what these past 18 months have meant to me 

"And this is the account of HERMANA NYDEGGER and her companions, their journeyings in the land of Spain, their sufferings in the land, their sorrows, their affflictions, and theirINCOMPREHENSIBLE JOY...and the safety of the brethren. And now may the Lord, the Redeemer of all men, bless their souls forever."

It sounds so cliche but it is truly in essence what I feel that this mission has been! It has been hard. Missions are hard! And it almost doesn´t make sense how incredible it is. The people of Spain will have a spot in my heart that will never be filled by anyone else! I am completely and totally overcome with gratitude and humbleness when I think of this mission and what our Heavenly Father has done for and through me. It has been EVERYTHING to me and I feel so sad that it will be coming to an end soon. I have often thought that the biggest secret the church may have is how hard missions are and how amazing they are. One who loses himself will indeed find himself and BECOME.. something that happens little by little through meaningful prayer and scripture study, and from doing.

I came out on a mission set to change other people's lives but ultimately it was mine that changed

Taking that leap of faith and deciding to serve was the best decision I have made thus far.

I have SUCH a testimony of this work. It is called 'work' for a reason!

I saw the lowest of lows and highest of highs

Cried 'til I laughed

Laughed 'til I cried

Sprinted way to many times in a skirt

worked with amazing elders and sisters

witnessed people with the hardest lives manifest the most beautiful faith

ate some of the scariest food ever

felt closer to my family than ever before

saw and felt the Lord´s hand in His work

gained an unfailing testimony

made lifelong relationships in a foreign country

learned how to really pray 

prayed harder than I ever have before

felt more love for people than ever before

Was stretched past my limits

Came to know of the reality of Jesus Christ my savior

and came closer to my Heavenly Father than ever before

I have felt like I have been put through the refiner´s fire, but that is how it is SUPPOSED to be and I wouldn´t have it any other way! It is so weird thinking about how much I have felt that I have grown and changed on a mission!

The Lord has been so good. He works with His missionaries. He sends prepared people to prepared missionaries.

One of the major themes of my mission has been FEAR NOT. In the scriptures it tells us to FEAR NOT over 650 times! I started out feeling pretty inadequate. I left the MTC thinking that I spoke the language decently well. Well that was a huge wake-up call when I realized how little I knew! Little by little with diligent study, prayer, and faith I was able to overcome that. I thought that life would be a breeze if once I learned the language. I quickly learned that it actually was not at all! Ultimately I learned what it IS the represent Christ, do things His way not mine, be 100% worthy of the spirit, and ultimately FEAR NOT MAN including myself

I would like to share a story with you all about Julia.

A few months ago we were really working hard with J. to get her off of her lifetime additction of tobacco. J. about 6 months ago moved into this tiny hostel room. From talking to the owner, when she first moved in the walls were completely white. She lived there and her sister and son would hang out with her in the little room all day. Between the 3 of them they would smoke 50 cigarrettes in an hours time. Little by little over the course of 6 months, they walls ultimately turned completely yellow from all of the smoke. Almost brown. The smell was atrocious. Everytime anyone walked in, you felt like you could die. The spirit was not there. It was a very dark room. I felt so sad for her everytime I walked in thinking about how her life has come to this low living. We were determined to change it and so was she. So one night we went over to her room with Justino our ward mission leader (he is the most amazing person ever) Gave her a blessing. The Spirit was present - it felt like fire. Afterwards we got to work spraying and scrubbing the walls. Which is quite the process. It is the expensive product that you spray all over the wall and is used to remove the tobacco which is so deeply soaked into the wall. We had to rinse out the rags SO many times and every time we would wipe it and it would look clean and then we would spray it again and more yellow liquid would just ooze out again again and again. After 3 hours of long hard scrubbing the walls became white. We could physically feel the room being filled with the spirit as the walls got whiter.

While we worked we had J. sit down and write down all of the reasons why she wants to quit smoking. At one point she came back into the room to see how it was going. She ended up staying in the room and watched us in humble silence. She then grabbed the Book of Mormon, sat on her bed, put on her glasses, and began to read. She then left the room, we continued working, and we realized what had just taken place. We as missionaries teach our investigators all they need to know so that they can become clean physically and spiritually. And with all of the seen and unseen efforts of everything that takes place in this work, nothing can happen unless they do their part. They can´t just listen to us they have to use the atonement to make them clean. And how do we feel the power of the atonement in our life? We have meaningful prayer everyday, we read the scriputres, and we attend our church meetings. Simple as that! J. was doing her part at that moment as she sat on her bed and read the Book of Mormon. She personally was changing and the color of her walls were changing.

Everytime I think back to what happened that one Saturday night I can only picture the room being filled with the Lord and His ANGELS. I know we were not the only ones present in that room and that J. felt the perfect love our her savior and the eternal affects of the atonement. The spirit was so strong and so clear and so real. The darkest room and life I had ever known became the lightest room and lightest life I had known.

That night I felt so tired and physically DONE. I felt the spirit so strong and physically and mentally and spiritually saw a change in J. And that was only the start! As I was scrubbing those walls with all of my might and looked down at J. reading I couldn´t help but think and feel of the atonement of my Savior. As missionaries we represent Christ. And it is not easy! It is hard. I know that it is the smallest form of an analogy but I realized more fully how hard the atonement was for Christ and how he must have felt. Walking home that night I just internalized what had happened and just thought, how would the world be if everyone had the faith of little J. to completely and on full blast let the atonement work in their lives. She lived in the lowest of lows and Christ brought her to her highest of highs.

Thinking back to allllll of the things I have heard, felt, and believed these past 18 months, one of the most precious truths I have come to know is the reality of our older brother and redeemer Christ. I can now say with all of my heart that I KNOW Him and I know what it means to represent Him. I know Him. And I KNOW that He lives and I know that He steps with us every single step of the way. I know that He did truly suffer for me and for each and everyone of us. I have felt that my words may never be sufficient to share the beauty the message deserves. It is only through Him that we can change. It is through Him that I have changed and grown so rapidly over these past 18 months and it is through Him that I will keep changing for the rest of my life until I am perfect like Him! Everyone can change. And we can changenow. Christ offers us WHITE pages to start over every second of our lives. He invites ALL to come unto Him. To forgive and forget! And to follow Him and be protected. That is the beauty of this message. We HAVE a very real Father in Heaven who loves us and cheers us on, cries with us when we are sad, and rejoices with us when we are happy! He sent His Son to die for us and it is only through Him that we can return to God again. 

Another enternal truth I have come to realize is that Joseph Smith DID IN FACT see God the Father and His Son. 

I LOVE this gospel. I love it more than any other thing. It makes so much sense to me. I love my life. I love being a missionary of the Lord. I pray so hard that God will grant me to never forget how I have felt here in Spain.

MORE HAPPINESS AWAITS you than you have ever experienced as you labor among His Children

The Lord has been so good for me and I know that He knows everything I feel and that He is preparing a life for me. I am sad to leave. I am sad to leave a place that I have given my whole heart and soul to! But all I can do is get on my knees and offer the most sincere prayer of my heart and give thanks for this opportunity my God has given me.

I thank you all so much from the deepness of my heart for all of your honest and faithful prayers. Thank you for your words and all you have done for me. I will never be able to thank you enough! I am so happy and I know I couldn´t have done it without the most incredible family and PARENTS who taught me and eventually prepared me for this journey of a lifetime. I can´t wait to give you all a real hug and give thanks for the Lord for the good He does.

I will be seeing you all soon! 

OS QUIERO

Hermana Nydegger

Trust in Him

Monday…November 24th, 2014

Well hi there fam! 

Life is the weirdest thing lately but before I get too sad I want to tell you about the AMAZING thing that our journey called life is. You know it is so crazy thinking back at our life and remembering how SCARED we have felt at many transitions in life and then knowing that once that mountain is climbed and we look back at how FAR we have come, it brings strength and happiness. I wish that we could see it in the moment! But I guess that that is the cool part about life. God loves us so much that He allows hardships to make us better. To make the people that He intends us to be. I have been feeling pretty tender feelings lately. I have been trying to think of how to possibly describe how I feel and I think that I would say that I feel NUMB.. full and empty at the same time. I actually kind of feel like I am leaving the MTC again but on a whole different scale.. I have thought about all of the incredible people that I have met and been able to love and reflect about my now unfailing testimony.. and I feel empty thinking about how I have no idea what is ahead of me and how this year and a half has just gone so fast. I am excited to come home and know that there is so much ahead.. but at the same time I feel like I am dying. I know that I am and that I will always be where I am needed when I have the spirit by my side. I think that is true with just about ANYTHING in life or any transition.. an empty and full feeling. That is where faith comes in! We have to constantly strive to love and make the most of our lives, where we currently stand, giving miles and miles of gratitude along the way. This life is SHORT. it really is. and it is amazing!

Things will work out for those who love and trust God.

I feel this poem here wraps up my thoughts and feelings

“I was reflecting yesterday if I would call the mission a sacrifice. And for everything it seems I might have sacrificed, I feel like I have been given tenfold. If I say I have sacrificed time with my family, then I must realize that I have been rewarded with a family more united and loving than ever. If the mission has been a sacrifice of time, I have been rewarded with knowledge that no university in the world could have taught me. If it has been a sacrifice of my talents, I have been rewarded with more than I ever had before. I can speak Spanish, I care more genuinely about people, [and] I am less quick to judge and more anxious to serve. If it has been a sacrifice of human relationships, I have been rewarded with practice in speaking to men and women from all walks of life and in diverse situations. If I have sacrificed my earthly possessions, I have been given new ones that I value infinitely more. For anything I have sacrificed I have been given more.”

OKAY enough for random thoughts.. This week has been great! The only down side is that I am SICK, ahhh it's horrible. Pray for me please! But this week has been full of miracles. Turns out that I am having my last miracle baptism this coming Saturday! That was a miracle and I am happy to be able ot participate in a last baptism. Her name is S.  She is from Galicia and she is 27 years old and is the a beautiful girl. I have learned so much from her. She is so receptive to the spirit because of her tendendy to be really silent and to really think and meditate. We have been working with her for a while now and I am so happy for her to take this huge leap of faith. Everything, including basic knowledge of Jesus Christ, is new to her. S. feels the spirit and acts on it so fast but I really and truly feel for her so much! We were up laying in bed last night just talking about how much we love her and feel this strong connection to her. I love her! She is such a brave person and I love her. We pulled out her baptism white dress the other day to show her and she just started to cry. There is something that is so pure about her.  You just feel it when you are around her. I think it might just have to do with how she hasn´t had a lot of real direction in her life. She will be baptized this Saturday and respond to her leap of faith. She works in a hair salon and we always teach her there. :)

We got a lesson with J. this week and it made me so happy! Little by little with her. She still has got that fire of faith strong inside of her. I will never forget that. We have just been loving her and serving so much everyday every chance that we get. I think that is ultimately our message we have for the world. That of love and service!

Thanksgiving is this week! How crazy how time does fly! I will never forget that our gratitude has a lot to do with the faith that we have. I don´t know if I have told you about this activity that we do every Sunday night.. but when I got here we came up with the great idea to do a pancake night every Sunday night! And we have been holding that tradition strongly since week one. It is just a little thing we do so that members and investigators and everyone can come! We did it last night and had a great turn out. We make seriously over 50 pancakes every sunday night. It was fun! We decided to share the message of gratitude and celebrate it there with those who came. We went around and said one thing that we are greatful for. I just sat there and it was so nice to just be able to soak up the spirit that comes so fast from sharing our blessings.

Be bold about expressing your gratitude! Do it every minute. You can never say to much! It brings the spirit and you will be happy. You will see the very many blessing you have the many more that are out there for us to have.

I love you all a ton and I pray for you constantly! Especially you KATIE I pray for you alllll of the time that you will learn the language and just be HAPPY and help others to be happy like you despite how hard it gets.. that you may grow to love the mission and lose yourself and find yourself.

Make this week count!

Hermana Nydegger

If the Savior stood beside me, would I be?

Monday…November 17th, 2014

I CAN¨T BELIEVE THAT KATIE LEAVES IN A WEEK! I saw some pictures from the Arnetts.. they have a niece in Katie's mission, and it looks BEAUTIFUL! how exciting! Ahhh I remember those feelings like they were yesterday!

This week has been SO fast and it makes me so nervous. Seriously these are your feelings at the end of your mission.. UP down UP down UP down. I just have the biggest butterflies in my stomach constantly.

Zone conference was AMAZING. And it was the WEIRDEST thing because I am the only one in our whole zone going home. I am a loner and it doesn´t help being one of the only Hermana's in Galicia! It was fun and was the last big trip as a missionary. Nothing better than being SURROUNDED by missionaries.. people who have been called and authorized by God to be in this very little part of the world! You can literally feel the authority in every single one of them. And you can see the worthy power that they exercise! I just LOVE it. I have always loved going to conference because it is the clearest example of noticing authority! I love so much when the prophet walks in, everyone stands up, and there is just total silence and you just feel the the power of his divine calling and AUTHORITY ring through your body? How powerful would we be as missionaries if we knew how to truly exercise this divine power! We all have been set apart. But it is up to us and our personal worthiness to be able to let others see and FEEL of this power! I think it is something that we as missionaries forget a lot of times. I mean we have been called and given this authority! In the scriptures it talks all of the time about how we are few. Being a fellow missionary among over 80,000 now, and thinking about how many people there are in the world, it is TRUE. I am part of the very few! It is humbling and it is a privilege. We are few in number. But God never calls the most or the best of the best! He actually calls in in our weakness and makes us who he needs us to be! We are few, but we are lucky. Something that I have been learning my whole mission is how to actually exercise the power that I have that comes from my calling of being a representative of Christ. How to TRULY exert this power so that people can feel it clearly and know who I work for and who I testify of.

This past week I have learned COUNTLESS things as always! But here are some of the few that I would like to share with you all.

First, when investigators are baptized, they are still BLINDFOLDED. So on Tuesday night our zone leaders gave an awesome fireside walking an investigator literally through the steps of the gospel of Christ! I was picked to be the blindfolded investigator and I learned something that I have never known my entire mission. Something that changes everything about the work. So they blindfolded me and put on a backpack fulllll of hymn books and put me in the back. The back pack represented my sins and life. They missionaries began to teach me and guided me every single step. The steps through faith, repentance, baptism, receiving the holy ghost, and enduring to the end. Interestingly enough though, I was blindfolded the entire time! Although I felt to spirit, and as the weight on my shoulders was ultimately lifted, it was the most confusing thing ever. It was so scary also! I couldn't see anything. I could hardly hear what they were telling me. And I constantly ran into things. The thing that hit me the hardest was the ENDURING part. After you are baptized and have the holy ghost.. you still have a hard time seeing where exactly you are going! Actually, you can´t see still! You feel good but it is still terrifying! So we all know that the enduring to the end is the hardest part but it wasn´t until that very night that I truly FELT it. The path of the gospel is a strait and narrow. My missionaries guided me through every step I seemed to take, no matter how little, I ran into a chair until at the very end when I finally made it to the celestial kingdom and the blindfold I was able to pull off and see alllll I had done and where I came from. You guys it was the weirdest and coolest and most eye opening experience ever! I think for the very first time I was actually able to put myself into the actual place of converts and investigators and feel how SCARY but good that it is. The whole time I couldn´t help but think about J. and how she is STILL blindfolded. We are all in a sense! She has changed her life and feels better but still has no idea really where she is going although there are people telling her along the way. It truly and completely required faith. It is something that you just have to DO! She is out there and her testimony is growing and it is strong.. but she is in the dark! For the first time I felt how truly dark and confusing it is. I learned the importance of helping them in the details of every step along the way. The wholeee way. Especially the endurance part. It is a scary world that we are in. It is dark and scary world that J. is in and she, as well as all of us, needs help and needs to use agency to ultimately use faith and make it there! 

Second

CHRIST is who I strive to represent and is who allows me to do all I do. The whole theme of the conference was If the Savior Stood Beside Me. The Savior does not ever abandon His missionaries. He is actually right THERE. Right next to us during the hard just as much as during the good. Every single door that is slammed into our face, every single person that rejects us, every trial, ever tear, every heart ache.. he is THERE for all of it. I felt it more than I have this week than my entire mission. Maybe it is because I am truly looking now for his presence during this marvelous and hard work. I have felt not just his spirit but his presence in some of the hardest moments. I KNOW that this is his work. I know that there is nothing better and nothing more important. I am just a 20 year old girl but I will never deny or be able to deny what I have felt of Christ out here on this beautiful mission in Spain. I know He lives. I know that He works with His missionaries. I have felt it and I cannot deny it! I love my mission. No matter how hard it gets you know that you are literally standing shoulder to shoulder with the best life that there is. The Savior does stand beside me everyday.  I had an interesting experience the other day. I have been praying constantly for J. and I still do and I am grateful for all of your humble prayers. I called her the other day to see if we could stop by and to my biggest shock she said that she doesn´t want us to visit her any more. I just HURT for her knowing that she is in the dark and we need to do all we can to help her even though it is ultimately her agency to use her leaps of faith. The other day we saw J. in the street just sitting there and I almost lost it. I just felt this sadness that I have not felt before. For a second I wanted to turn around and walk the other way, but I said a little prayer, and felt that we should walk by and say Hi. I felt that the Lord would do it, so I did it. We walked by and seeing her look up and seeing the pain in her soul was so hard! We waved to her and all though she didn´t really want to talk she gave us her little toothless smile and cute wave. Even though I couldn´t do anything else, I literally FELT Christ wave with me and walk with me past her. I felt his love and it was the most beautiful feeling ever knowing that I have done my part and that He walked WITH me.

I know that Christ walked WITH us. I have never felt closer to Him my entire life than I have on my mission and I strive to represent Him in every way possible to be the vessel He intends for me to be.

Hermana Nydegger

Raining cats and dogs!

Monday…November 10th, 2014

Mi querida familia,

So here I am sitting at a locutorio about to head up to A Coruña for my last zone conference ever. I don´t really know what to say! I am feeling WEIRD! Really really reallllly mixed feelings. It is such a special and tender experience. But I am excited. They are such JOYS, zone conferences and other meetings. And they are so needed and really boost you up. I will let you know how it goes!

On Wednesday we had our monthly zone meeting in Santiago and that was fun too. Funny thing.. the zone leaders had picked on us to do this demonstration of how to plan to get investigators to church and so we were all sitting in a circle and had to put ourselves in the middle of the circle and just plan like normally as if we were in our apartment but in front of everybody.. can you say a little 'awkward'? Ha but it was fun and a good practice. It is all just too weird this whole thing coming to an end! I catch my self just speechless anytime anyone here asks me how I am doing! I literally can´t respond or find words to even describe how I truly am feeling!

It has been RAINING CATS AND DOGS. Holy cow I don´t think I even knew what rain was until I came up here to Galicia! Now I know it better than Utah snow :) MOM thank you SO much for the rain boots! Seriously if you don´t have rain boots here you are the biggest fool! They are great and perfect. And they are comfortable and go with everything! They came the day before and I picked them up literally an hour before the down pour. Perfect timing thanks to the Lord! And they were easy to pick up. I love my cute mom!

So we seriously had THE most fun week with J. but for some reason she has been acting weird lately. It really worried me because she wasn´t reading her scriptures and was just not her new self. Anyways we were just so caught off guard when she didn´t show up to church on Sunday and then called after to apologize and say that she won´t be coming anymore..

I answered that call and about dropped the phone I was so speechless.. I just PRAYED so hard to try and understand and know what to do! We were running to our eating appointment so I asked her if it was okay to talk in person right after and to stop by.

So we went by and my heart just BROKE as she began to tell how she misses her old life and her 'freedom' to do whatever she wants. Julia is an interesting case because she didn´t have much structure to her life. I had the impression to ask her if she had smoked and she said 'yes' :( She is a wide open book and you can tell so easily when something is wrong! Anyways we just sat there for the longest time talking to her trying to figure out with her what had happened. It just killed me so bad. It was like she had completely forgotten about the many blessings she has seen in her life due to the gospel. We talked about the covenant she made with God and how she will find MORE freedom in the church than any other place. She listened really hard but still kept firm to what she told us and wants to take a break and see if there really is a difference in her life when she lives the gospel. It was so hard. I just felt crushed! I just don´t get it at all why people have a hard time understanding that this is truly the ONLY way to happiness! It was hard because Julia has come SO far and she is everything to me. I just pray constantly that she will see the difference and be able to come back. It was the strangest thing ever.

It made me think for a second about how God must feel when we go off and just don´t understand what He gives and offers to us over and over again! How sad He must feel and how it can be so hard for us to understand! Why is it so hard to just not see the whole picture? We need to stay close to God in all of our decisions. I have so much faith that Julia will come back! It just worries me. We think that something else must have happened..it is a huge mystery and happened all so fast.

PRAY FOR HER. Pray for her! She at least agreed to praying and talking it over with God before she makes any major decisions. 

I love you all. I love the mission more than anything and I am so happy! I am enjoying every moment and I feel so grateful at this time for this biggest miracle in my life.. being able to give all I have to the Lord during this year and a half and have him make out of me what he knows to be the best. There is nothing better than the mission! No matter how hard it gets. It is so worth it 

OS QUIERO!

Hermana Nydegger

IT'S Life!

Monday…November 3rd, 2014

Hi family!

THANKS FOR THE PACKAGE. I loved it! You are all just the greatest!

How was Halloween?? It is so weird in Spain! just a whole different level of Halloween. We actually didn´t do anything and like forgot until later in the day! Ha

J. is doing AMAZING and seriously just glows more and more and more and MORE everyday! It has been the coolest thing to watch. We visit her like everyday almost right after medio dia at 4 30. She has been so funny because out of no where she just has this strongest desire to learn English! She doesn´t have any teeth except for one in the back, and she is 53 with pretty much an entire life of smoking, so I am not sure how much English she really retains haha. She does remember random words though and it is the cutest thing because her pronunciation is just so cute. Something that she ALWAYS says, "ITS life." So we taught that to her in English and now she always says,

"ITS life...." as she tilts her head with the cutest toothless smile you have every seen in your life.  She has the sweetest spirit!

Hahaha now when anything falls through or doesn´t go the way it was planned to be, Hermana Bennett and I just say ITS life in her heart melting accent. I love that woman so much!. 

This week has been great! Its been full of a TON of walking. Everyday is seriously a hike! But it is going great. I love my new comp! I am sad that I will only have 1 transfer with her! She reminds me so so much of Hermana Christian. She is from Utah and DAD her dad served a mission in south africa and maybe you know him?? I think it must have been around the same time!  You will have to let me know! It is so fun because we seriously talk about Tenerife and the people there alllll of the time. It gives me the craziest flashbacks to being on that island. We definitely get Los Cristianos trunky.. but hey, its better than home trunky!

We started teaching this girl from Nigeria and we seriously had the weirdest time trying to teach her the restoration because she was FORCE feeding her 4 month baby the whole time. Haha typical Africans. It was so sad! She would pinch his sweet little cheeks so that he would cry and then try to get milk down his little throat! It was a little disturbing and didn´t help with having an atmosphere in which she could feel the spirit.

I called I. this cute 24 year old Bolivian that we were teaching a while back with Hermana Braithwaite when she out of know where fell off of the face of the earth. So I called her the other day and she finally answered and told me that she has been in the hospital for the last few weeks.. So I was like, oh my, what happened!! and she was like... 

"Me asustó un serpiente y me puse muy mal..." or a SNAKE scared me and I got really sick and worse and worse each day!"

HAHA! I died laughing it was so hard to not burst out laughing. I've never had an excuse like that in my whole mission.  Gotta love it when an investigator tells you that they can´t meet with you because a snake scared them. 

Sorry such random things! It was a good week. We FINALLY get to meet with G. again tomorrow for the second time. She was one of those miracles that I was telling you about ages ago! PRAY for her. She is so golden.

I love you all so much! I love the mission. I try not to think about it coming to an end.  It does not feel real at all! But then I just pray everyday and thank my Heavenly Father for this amazing JOURNEY of joy that I have experienced these past 17 months.  It has been incredible!

Hermana Nydegger

ps…Random pics! I brought my wrong cam card so enjoy some old pics from the glorious torry john :) MISS THESE PEEPS. This was my last night there!

LAST TRANSFER…This is not a dream!

Monday…October 27th, 2014

Dearest family,

As I come to the end of my mission life really seems like a blur! 

SO MUCH FOR A NATIVE COMPANION..I got my last transfer call and was sad at the fact that I will never be getting a native companion! But I am SO happy to stay in Vigo and to be able to end this mission in one of my favorite places in the world. It still just doesn't click ANYTHING at all about going home. I feel like I will be going home but then that I will be just flying RIGHT back out. I feel like I will in deed be a missionary for the rest of my life! I feel at peace but I also feel just so deeply sad at moments. I am going to miss the mission so much, family!! Well my new companion will be Hermana Bennett…Hermana Christian trained her like right after I left Tenerife so I am excited to just be able to talk for days about Los Cristianos! Speaking of which, I found that M. (this colombian boy Hermana Phillips and I worked with.. remember?) got baptized! what a great feeling that I have for him and his family. It may have been a year later, but I just glad he finally got baptized. We worked so much with him and his mom who was less active. Anyways Hermana Bennett should be great! R. is going to freak out probably when I tell her! I am excited! 

This past transfer has been great and has just FLOWN by. Holy cow it just scares me how fast these next ones will fly! My whole mission every transfer pretty much has been faster than the previous.. and if that continues.. I will be home in literally 2 seconds. I am going to miss Hermana Braithwaite so much! I learned so much from her. She is truly an incredible missionary. I still can't even believe that she is going home! She and Hermana money! It is so weird because I feel like I am pretty much part of their group! I guess it means I am going home soon.

Saturday night after saying goodbye to her it just made me reflect sooo much on this LAST transfer and it really made me think that I want to do ALL that I can and just leave every last drop of me in the mission field and magnify my calling even to the very grain. I want and I need to get all that I can out of this incredible and MIRACLE mission.

This past week I got a letter from a friend that was a direct answer. And I have been pondering so much about it this whole week. It has been hitting me hard all week.

3 Ne 8:1-"He truly did many miracles in the name of Jesus; and there was not any man who could do a miracle in the name of Jesus save he were cleansed every WHIT from his iniquity."

WOW! I cannot to any miracle unless I be completely cleaned of every sin even to the little particle. That hit me HARD. It hit me hard because it allowed me to feel and it allowed me to recognized the 100 ways my past life, and current life in the mission that I need to improve. It hit me like TO my very heart. I hit me because I know and I have known that I need to be repenting more earnestly and sincerely and diligently and harder of my sins. I have been working so hard and giving my all and NOW I am working so much harder to be 100% completely through and through clean! I am pouring my heart more and more to the Lord! I want to FEEL CLEAN. Clean and pure like J. right after being baptized. I have recognized my so many mistakes that I have made and I am praying to know if there is any thing more that I need to repent of. Every day we sin without knowing and a lot of the time when we do know. I just want to completely purge myself of any particles of sin from before and during the mission. I want to be as pure and clean that I can be. To be able to answer all of the questions in Alma 5 and to be able to say that I did my best! I am not perfect. Complete perfection is not achieved in this life. But Complete PROGRESSION is. We can be clean, completely clean. We can literally hear and literally feel the Lord telling us, GO thy way and sin no more. and I the Lord will remember then no more. I know there is so much I lack and sometimes I feel that it is all I see, but I am here to humble myself to the Lord and be that worthy vessel in which He can work His miracles.

I Love the Lord. I love the mission. I love repentance and how we truly can feel 100% CLEAN. I am working towards it and I know that It is what I need to do! I am truly FEELING more God directed in my life. And it is overwhelming! How beautiful is it that we can be cleaned from every little whit of sin. Anyone can feel it thanks to the atonement. It is a lesson that I have been learned and it is taking me along time to learn! The cool thing thought is that our Heavenly Father is so patient with us and he knows our hearts and he knows we try.

I think about Alma's cry when he said, "And now, my brethren, I wish from the inmost part of my heart, yea, with great anxiety even unto pain, that ye would hearken unto my words, and cast off your sins, ands, NOT procrastinate the day of your repentance." It just hit me so hard this week thinking about repentance! As missionaries we have the authority to call people who are under our stewardship to repentance (I love it haha) but how often to I call MYSELF to MY repentance? The scriptures countless times has profets that PLEAD to us from the innermost part of their hearts that we repent. Every one of us sins in one way or another and repentance is crucial part of life! Not only that is is the BEST thing we have thanks to a loving Saviour who loves us so much. How often to we call ourselves to repentance?? for it is the true only way and it's the HAPPY way!

Well, I hope you didn't fall asleep in my preaching! It is just something that means a lot to me and is deep in my heart. Please forgive me for anything thing I have done that has every been against the will of the Lord. I love you all so much. It would mean and help me a lot if you could pray for me and help me know in what areas I need to improve in these last 6 weeks! What I need to change and was I need to do. 

We as people are always changing! May we take time to think prayerfully and consider the ways we need to change and the sins, even the smallest, that we need to fix with our Lord.

Random side not.. FUNNIEST sunday ever yesterday with J. She shows up in the cute dress Hermana Braithwaite gave her and with just a TON of makeup on. Haha it was so cute! Everyone was so happy to see her. The best part about this whole thing though was the fact that she physically could NOT stay awake during the sacrament meeting including the hymns! We giggled the whole time and was probably the most irreverent sacrament meeting of my life hahaha. We did everything to keep her awake and she just couldn't no matter what we did. At one point we gave her mints and paper to draw on which just resulted in DROOL and lots of it.    She was so tired she couldn't even finish her sentences before her head falling down into a deep sleep. She looked over to us and was like, Tengo verguenza! and then CRASH her head fell. Haha!  Poor thing.  We decided to tell her to just go home, there was no way she would make it all 3 hours. We were slightly worried if she would make it home safely as we watched her slowly walk away. Gotta love Julia!

Dad I loved what you said, sometimes we do focus on the ENDURING to the end. We need to endure it to the end and ENJOY the end

Con mucho amor,

ME

WHOOPS! Here are some of the best pictures that I meant to send of J. last week..

Fun activity we did on Wednesday night!

Dropping off Hermana Braithwaite last night…ME in 6 weeks!

It's Raining Miracles

Monday...October 20, 2014

IT'S RAINING MIRACLES.  Hallelujah its raining miracles!

What a week. This whole mission is really the biggest blur! I want to do all that I can so that it stays with me completely crystal clear forever.

I loved what you said mom and dad about loving others. Something that every child of God needs to not just hear but to KNOW is that there indeed is a God in Heaven that loves them immensely and perfectly, and that they can become like Him.

The most effective missionary (or person) is one that works through love.

Saturday may have just been one of the most beautiful and rewarding nights of my entire mission. Or better said J. may just be one the biggest miracles of my time here as a full time missionary.

Those who will pursue this course and truly embark on a mission will see miracles every day. That is one of the beauties of the mission with the biggest miracle being the change within you.

J. was baptized on Saturday night! And G. too.. this Peruvian girl that we have been working with. One of those classic and special investigators who investigates for YEARS. Anyways,  G. this sweet Peruvian teenager was baptized! That was a miracle in itself  but the true miracle was cute little J. whose affect has touched my life forever.

J. stopped smoking! SHE did it because of her testimony in Christ. It was so touching and I cannot wait to share all of these incredible relationships that I have here in Spain with you all at home. The gospel truly does CHANGE people. It really changes people. I don´t know how it all works exactly, but people CHANGE through the power of the atonement. Saturday we had a huge and special spirit there in the little Vigo branch! There were just miracles on miracles! I wish I could tell you all of them. We have worked so HARD with J.  but it seems like all of that just wipes right away when you sit there and see them get baptized and hear them bear their short and sweet testimony. Before my mission I had always wondered what baptism nights would feel like. How you would feel? And honestly just being able to reflect back on my mission, you really don´t even think for ONE second about yourself and all of the sacrifice you have made, as some would call it, but you can only think about how much you LOVE this person and how far they have come. I sat there just thinking about what a privilege that it truly is to be a missionary of the Lord and what a privilege it is to be able to be used as an instrument in His hands. The coolest thing about J. has been the physical and mental difference that we have seen as she has been able to use the atonement in her life, repent, and GLOW. People glow! The atonement literally has this affect that allows people to shine and glow no matter what as they completely become cleansed. What a humbling privilege it is to be able to reflect back and just feel of the power of Lord and how it truly was Him that brought forth this change according to the faith of the participant.

One of the most powerful moments of my mission is 100% when J. got up to share her testimony after being baptized. It was so simple and just reminds me of the power of simple and pure testimony. Quick side note...when we had told her earlier that day about having to bear her testimony we had her practice with a spoon HAHA see the picture. She had no idea what to say and it was so funnnnny practicing with her! But when J. got up there, she said something COMPLETELY different.

She said something like this...

Some of you know me, and some of you don´t. My name is J.  I was brought to the church through M. who brought me to the hermanas, who brought me to the Lord. This is the first time that I have ever been baptized and I am so happy. I had a virus for about my whole life - Smoking! But I want you all to know this night that it was the Lord that cured me. He has a power to allow people to change. May we stay away from the bad, and bring ourselves to the good. In the name of Jesus Christ.

With that little testimony she had everyone in tears! What a POWERFUL and humble testimony. To hear from someone who has had the hardest life ever know the Lord can help us. She was GLOWING! I have never felt the spirit so strong! I LOVE J. She has the best heart. I just want to THANK you all who have prayed and had her in your hearts. Prayers bring miracles through the Atonement of the Lord! We have seen a miracle! No one would have thought that someone could change so radically. She changed from a weak little lady to a white glowing angel. She was a angel that night!

THE LORD LIVES! I have a prayer in my heart for all of you.

Hermana Nydegger

And this prayer goes out to all the...

Monday...October 13, 2014

BUENOS DIAS!

Best part of conference was when Elder Holland was like, "Bien hecho EDUARDO." HAHA

J. is doing amazing. Found out that she used to smoke 3 cigarettes at the same time back in her youth.. what amazing progress she has made.

So we visit her everyday and every day she dedicated her prayers to something! She has dedicated a prayer to Africa, the homeless, the druggies, yeah name a type of person and YOU¨VE GOT IT! She prays for everyone. It is actually really cool but hilarious. Especially the other day when she asked us who should pray for today! And we were just like J. pray for yourself and for your son today! And she was like Okay! Then she starts her prayer and then was like, "Father, today I am praying for all of the PROSTITUTES out there.. their life is a sad hard life and they need your guidance. And please bless all of the drunks, some do it out of hardship and some do it out of pleasure, and some will soon will be with you." Hermana Braithwaite and I just about BURST out laughing when that came out of her mouth. Lets just say she gives the best, very specific and literal prayers in a gangster kind of way. I LOVE HER! 

We went to Santiago a few weeks ago for a conference and had some time during medio dia to walk around and see the Cathedral.  

It honestly was one of my most favorite things I have seen in Spain!

 It was SO cool. I feel so truly lucky to be in such a beautiful place that people come to from all over the world! We went there and there are just THOUSANDS of people who have hiked who knows how many miles to get there from all of the world. It actually is a really spiritual experience for a lot of these people! My favorite was this one guy from Poland (see the picture) just sprawled out there having just recently arrived. We went up to him and asked up what brought him here and you know what he said?? "I came here to find God."

It made me think of HOW many bazillion people there are out there that are looking for God! And how much a LOVE being a missionary. How much of a meaningful experience that God has given me. And how much MORE that the Lord gives us

Nothing else, no other choice we make can make of us what HE CAN.

HE CAN MAKE ME BETTER THAN I CANE MAKE MYSELF! It is when we TURN outwards and not inwards that the atonement makes a different in our lives.

The most rewarding part of a mission is coming to understand the atonement more for myself! The atonement is not only for sinners. It is for EVERYONE. It is for the weary, the downtrodden, the broken hearted. Its for anyone who has loved and lost. It is for the simple frustrations, anxieties, and tears. The Atonement of our Savior and Redeemer is for every time the demands put on us go on beyond our natural ability, every time we are stretched beyond our resiliency. It is what allows us to reach beyond these earthly limitations and change our hearts, our very cores, to become like HIM. It is more real, further reaching, and more potent than any comfort or cure. It is the means by which we can become more able, more fulfilled and more perfect, the means by which each child of a Loving Father in Heaven can return to Him and become as He is.

There is so much that we don´t understand when it come to our purpose as people! But have what we need to make it back to the Celestial Kingdom! I love love love teaching people of the plan of Salvation. We taught it to a man the other day and it was just so cool seeing the dots connect in his head as he felt the spirit testify of the truthfulness of this plan. I love the gospel so much with all of my heart. Dad I remember right before I left you and I were talking about the process of learning the gospel throughout our whole lives and how mine is about to hit WARP SPEED on the mission! Its true.. I have grown and been stretched in a number of ways that I never could even imagine! Thus making the statement true that NOTHING else, no other choice we make can make of us what He can.

https://www.lds.org/bible-videos/videos/charity-never-faileth?cid=HPTH100214400&lang=eng

Well.. it has officially gotten cold we think! It has been raining everyday the past few days and my little umbrella didn´t quite make the cut out here in good old GALICIA so I bought myself a legit Gallego umbrella that is HUGE! Completely HUGE! HA not we say I truly look like a Gallega. You should see the umbrellas out here they are huge but they keep you dry until the wind!

I love you all SO much and I hope that you have a great week this week!

Hermana Ny