March 1, 2017

Valentine's Day - the Washington Federal Way Mission way!
Thanks Sister Zavala!

February was a great month full of Zone Conferences, missionaries coming and missionaries leaving, transfers, and quite a shake up of assignments throughout the mission.  Change is sometimes hard, but we can do hard things!
     "I can do all things through Christ which strengtheneth me."
                                                                                                                                                                                          Philippians 4:13


The missionaries didn't forget to honor President Rasmussen on President's day!

(Thanks to Sister Nebeker and Sister McClellan, and the office elders Elder Samuels and Elder Mortensen for the decorating)

Our departing missionaries attended the Seattle Temple and had a wonderful experience together.

Departing missionary devotional held at the mission home.
(Standing: L to R- President and Sister Rasmussen, Sister and President Campbell and Sister and President Layman)

Message from Elder and Sister Holliday, housing coordinators:

One of the major themes of the Doctrine and Covenants is the call to prepare.  The word prepare is found 137 times in its pages. A sampling of them would surely include "Prepare ye, prepare ye for that which is to come....," (D&C 1:12) "Prepare every needful thing," (D&C 88:119}  "prepare for the supper of the Lamb." (D&C 65:3)

One of the greatest fears in life is that of being unprepared, whether for a catastrophe or the Coming of the Lord.

Let this theme also be one that applies to your apartments.  Knowing where the water shut off valve is, having emergency phone numbers posted in an easy to access location, having a 1st Aid Kit, extra food and water, regularly testing and reporting your CO/Smoke detectors are also important.  Add to the list the need to have a clutter free apartment that is regularly cleaned and kept orderly.  

If you establish a lifetime habit of doing all you can to be prepared you will realize the truth of the Lord's promise, "If ye are prepared ye shall not fear." (D&C 38:30)  

As you especially prepare for the Coming of the Lord, you will know that he as also prepared for your coming.  To you he extends the greatest of all promises, "..in my Father's house are many mansions, and I have prepared a place for you; and where my Father and I am, there ye shall be also." (D&C 98:18)

ZONE CONFERENCE PICTURES:

Auburn Zone Feb 4th

Federal Way Zone Feb 4th

Puyallup South Zone Feb 7th

Graham Zone Feb 7th

Puyallup Zone Feb 8th

Enumclaw Zone Feb 8th

Renton Zone Feb 10th

Kent Zone Feb 10th

Message to the missionaries from Sister Rasmussen:

We enjoyed being with all of you at zone conference in February.  We learn and grow together from your personal dedication, testimony and insights into missionary work. Keep up the good work!  Following up on what President Rasmussen said about “With the Lord, all Things are Possible” I wanted to remind us all of some things we can do to reduce some of the challenges we all face while on a full time mission.  If we expect the Lord’s help, we need to do our part as well.

     We are wisely taught in Adjusting to Missionary Life that ”excessive stress can affect our health, ability to sleep and ability to handle temptation”.  Good nutrition and exercise help us manage stress better.  Elder Draney gave us some wonderful workout ideas I hope you are utilizing.  Remember his counsel: Nothing works until you do.

     As we strive to work hard every day to fulfil our purpose as missionaries, Preach my Gospel (page 23) offers us some great suggestion.  I think we would all benefit from reviewing them and picking a couple to earnestly work on.   “If you are having challenges, prayerfully choose one or two suggestions that seem right for you.  Not every suggestion will work for every person, but most ideas must be practiced for at least two or three weeks to begin to be helpful.   Look in the ‘General Principles for Managing Stress’ section on pages 17-22 for additional suggestions”  PMG p. 23.

1. Break down big or difficult tasks into smaller pieces.  If they still feel too hard, break them down more.  Then act.  If you wait to ‘feel Like’ working before starting, you may wait a long time.  Get started and motivation will follow.

2.  Pace yourself.  Vary the work you do and don’t work too long at just one activity.  Remind yourself:  All I have to do right now is _____.

3.  Get enough sleep, healthy food, water and exercise to have the stamina you need.

4.  Look for and welcome support, suggestions and encouragement from others. 

5.  Express gratitude.  Be grateful for not only you blessings but for your challenges and adversities and what you can learn from them.  This will open the door for the Lord to bless and help you.

     I have been keeping a gratitude journal this year and I have enjoyed the time it gives me to reflect on my many blessings.  You missionaries are often mentioned as you are one of them.  I want to take the advice here and be grateful for my challenges and adversities from now on.  Writing often helps us put our life in perspective as we spend quiet time thinking.  In doing this we put ourselves in a position to feel the Spirit and often receive guidance in our lives.      

      I know that with the Lord, all things are possible.  May we work hard to be physically and mentally healthy so He will help us go forward each day, teaching repentance and baptizing converts.  With faith in Him, we can accomplishing things that are not possible by ourselves. 

Random pics:

Sister McClellan and Sister Zavala - "30 minute lunch Professionals"

                     February Missionary Devotional pictures:

                                Recent converts who spoke at the devotional on Feb 19, 2017 -

Ezra

Ben

Wanda

                                                  Kent and Renton Zone Conference - Feb 10th

Can you believe it's February already?  We are looking forward to Zone Conferences which will start Saturday Feb 4th.  It's always so great to meet together, share each others spirit, learn from our leaders and bond in the brotherhood (and sisterhood) of Jesus Christ.

Quote from President Thomas S. Monson:

Cast out Doubt

“Your faith should not stand in the wisdom of men, but in the power of God”  1 Corinthians 2:5

"Remember, faith and doubt cannot exist in the mind at the same time, for one will dispel the other.  Cast out doubt.  Cultivate faith.  Strive always to retain that childlike faith which can move mountains and bring heaven closer to heart and home."

                                                                                               Thomas S. Monson

Our Washington Federal Way Missionaries had the wonderful opportunity to attend the Seattle Temple.

We divided the mission into two groups - the South Zones (Auburn, Enumclaw, Graham, Puyallup and Puyallup South) attended on Tuesday January 24, 2017.

South part of our mission - Temple Day!

The North zones of the mission (Federal Way, Kent and Renton) attended on Tuesday, January 31, 2017

North part of our mission - Temple Day!

                                                         

 It was an incredible, uplifting, joyous experience that will be remembered always!

Elder Kofford – Festival of Finding Missionary Moment:

This week was amazing! I was thinking Friday morning of what we could do for the Finding Festival. I didn't really want to spend 6 hours tracting and/or contacting. I wanted to do something a little more fun and productive... So I came up with the idea to draw out the plan of salvation with sidewalk chalk. And it was awesome! We had missionaries all over Auburn drawing it at parks and bus stations and right in front of the churches. The Olympic Elders had all of the little Marshallese kids come out and help them.  It was a ton of fun and we talked to so many people. We wrote out questions and scriptures and Mormon.org or Lds.org on all of them so even after we were gone people could look it up. It worked out really well! And it was sunny that morning. We were all praying for no rain so we could go out and draw and the sun came out that morning. It was perfect. 

  

Missionary Moment:  As told to Sister Rasmussen by a ward member.

                                            "Elder Knight's new shoes"

I wanted to share an incredible story that I had the privilege of witnessing a few days ago. We have an elder serving in our ward that has been out about 15 months. He is an incredibly humble servant of the Lord. His birthday is coming up this week. One of his investigators, a mother herself, was going with us to the missionary devotional on Sunday night and we met them so they could follow us. Before we left she indicated she wanted to speak with the missionaries. Her 15 year old son, who is getting baptized in 2 weeks, came over and handed this elder a box of shoes for his birthday. He was just blown away and immediately changed his shoes in the car so he could wear the new shoes to the devo. I texted his mom a picture and she was so touched that another mother would recognize this need for her son and act on that so sent me a note to pass along to thank this sweet sister for her generosity. This was the investigators reply. "I've had many missionaries but when these 2 came to the door immediately I had felt like my family had found me and I felt love and my loneliness started to dwindle away more and more. I had felt like I had been searching for them forever and here they were..my son feels the same..Like we are home where we belong.  There isn't anything my family wouldn't do for them..To see the smile when he was wearing his shoes warmed my heart. .so many people just put on shoes everyday and don't think of the significance of it..those last shoes had holes and were worn because he had searched and searched to find us..Now we are giving him new ones so he can continue to search for others so we can all be together again someday♡"

Missionary Devotional Jan 15th 2017

Our wonderful missionaries have been very busy bringing souls unto Christ.  We did not have a devotional in December, so invitations were sent to those who were baptized during November and December.

New members of the Church!

In addition to baptisms, we had countless referrals, findings, lessons taught and an outpouring 

of love and service to everyone in the Washington Federal Way Mission boundaries.

MISSIONARY DEVOTIONAL

Our missionary devotional, held January 15th at the Kent Stake Center, was an excellent coming together of missionaries, new converts, investigators and members.  Our wonderful choir did not disappoint in bringing the spirit through music, and a big thank you to Sister Edvalson, conductor and Sister Grimm, pianist.

The program for the evening contained the following highlights:

• Elder Hancock taught that "We are literally the spirit children of a loving Heavenly Father."

• New member, Jason Wilson, told of his conversion and bore testimony of the peace, assurance, consistency and surety of the Gospel of Jesus Christ.

• Sister Reynolds taught that "Christ provides the only way back to the Father."

Caleb Newton told of his conversion which included mormon.or, and of a  Book of Mormon that was slipped into his backpack.  "There's always better things to come!"

• Elder Roach taught us that "Truth and authority have been restored!"

Mehria Nessar told of her war torn childhood in Afghanistan and how we all need to
find our "personal perfect".  Her baptism into the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints
was her "personal perfect".

• Hermana Lewis taught "We can know the truth of these things for ourselves through the Holy Ghost."

• BreAnn Hake told of her love of the scripture found in Philippians "I can do all things thru Christ which strengthens me."  Since her baptism she feels "Now I have purpose, answers and peace in my life."

President Sterling Rasmussen bore testimony, and invited those in attendance to search further on the websites mormonchannel.org and discover.mormon.org.

President Stroud, Kent Stake President gave words of encouragement and also bore testimony of the truthfulness of the Gospel.

The entire evening was a spiritual feast for all in attendance!

I can't wait for the next devotional which will be on February 19th, 2017.

Washington Federal Way Festival of Finding

Message from Sister Rasmussen:  

     As a mission, we decided on December 17^th and the 24^th to go finding new investigators from 10:00 until 5:00.  Each zone organized their festival to meet their zone’s needs.  There was a variety of plans including many exchanges with companions (each lasting for only a couple of hours), meeting back as a zone for lunch and then scrambling the companionships again for the afternoon, mini Blitzes where they went to others areas, etc.   The initial announcement was met with great enthusiasm by many but great trepidation by some.  Five hours of finding!  Many had never done more than a couple of hours at a time.  With much planning and careful execution the day was a smashing success!  Sister Rasmussen texted every companionship in the afternoon to see how things were going and encourage them to the end.  There was no need for the encouragement.  There were having a ball and finding many new investigators.  We ended up having 169 new investigators the week of December 17^th.  And did I mention it was the coldest day of the year so far?  The high was 30 degrees.  But they were a mighty army of God as they marched toward great success.  There were too many blessings to list them all from this day but to name a few as recognized by the missionaries:

•      Greater zone unity
•      Elevated their vision of what they can accomplish when finding
•      Learning new finding techniques from other missionaries
•      Increased faith
•      Finding new investigators
•      Finding out finding can be fun!

These days were such a success we have decided to implement a “Festival of Finding” the first Saturday of each transfer.  We pray this will bring the above blessings and start the transfer out on the right foot, especially for new companionships.  We ask everyone to pray with us for many more successful festivals in the future.  Stay tuned for success stories that started with 150+ missionaries heading out together as a mighty army to find those who have been prepared to receive the restored gospel!

Departing Missionaries Temple Trip
November 2017 

Missionary Moment

On Jan 10, 2017 Elder Eric William Pinckney  wrote:

Hey Sister Rasmussen, as promised, here are a few pictures from our recent baptism!

It was such an amazing experience getting to teach these people.  I mostly taught Ryan (the 9 year old) and he was so smart!  Everything I taught he remembered and accepted.  Every lesson we had, he would always tell me how excited he was to be baptized by his brother.

The mother on the other hand, was also amazing! After every lesson Elder Jang would tell me how she would do anything and everything the gospel required of her so that she can have a happy family. The thing I believe that struck her the most was the fact that she can be sealed to her husband. (who had passed away a few years back).

It has been 4 short weeks since we started teaching them and now they are all a happy baptized member family :)   I am truly grateful for this experience we were able to have!  It has proven yet again that there are so many people in each of our areas who are just waiting for the Gospel!

But we must give credit to the Federal Way Sisters, (Sister Efnor and Sister Thurman)! If it wasn't for their hard work and their inspiration to knock on their door, none of this would have ever happened :)

"P-Day"

"P-Day" - Our missionaries have their preparation day on Monday's - unless it isn't...
To explain further, if there is a holiday on Monday the library is closed and our missionaries can't use the computers to email home.  So some weeks it is changed to Tuesdays.  Hopefully this doesn't cause too much confusion!

Departing Missionaries Temple Trip
January 10, 2017

Missionary Moment

On January 4, 2017 Elder Payne wrote:

Early Summer in 2016 Elder John and Elder Rex knocked on a media referrals door who was not receptive. Having faith they were there for a reason they began to knock on the surrounding doors when they knocked on Jazmine and Justine Salgatar's door.  Jazmine opened the door but was currently busy, however she agreed for a return appointment. Later she told us that she didn't know why she said yes to another appointment, but she felt something inside her tell her that she needed to listen. 

    

    Fast forward a few weeks; we get the dreaded call 30 minutes before the lesson and she tells us that she doesn't want to learn more. We asked for ten minutes that day to talk and during that short lesson we asked her to pray about what to do. After her genuine prayer she looked up, with tears peaking out of her eyes, and said, "Yes I will learn more." 

     

     Jazmine was baptized two months later.

 Justine, her identical twin, had a few holdups. One of them was over coming family opposition. It was a fast Sunday when Justine calls us to tell her she has decided she is going to be baptized. She was at work at asked us to tell Jazmine the amazing news. We made the call and Jazmine let at a sigh of relief immediately. She was so happy for several reasons but it also boosted her testimony of the power of fasting. She was fasting that day that Justine would get the answer to be baptized! Even though her parents still weren't actually on board, Justine was baptized a few weeks after that special fast Sunday.

 Now their parents let missionaries know they are welcome at anytime! Miracles both big and small happen as we listen to the spirit to go the extra step and knock the extra door.

Thanksgiving and Christmas were fabulous spiritual events!  So many tender mercies and miracles happening all around us as we shared the "Light the World" campaign.

This post will be full of pictures - feel the JOY our missionaries felt as demonstrated in their great smiles.

So much love sent from home!  This was one small delivery - our mailman delivered our record 72 parcels in one delivery.  So exciting for us to imagine the happiness each of these packages will bring our missionaries.

Two of our dedicated Zone Leaders, Elder Palmer and Elder Knight loading up their car to deliver to their Enumclaw zone.

Each Zone has a shelf - rarely did all the packages fit - lots of overflow all around!

 

     




  President and Sister Rasmussen loaded all this and more to the Stake Centers on Thursday Dec. 15th and 16th for the Christmas Devotional Dinners.  The yellow rolls are gifts of Mission Logo t-shirts.  Ask your missionary about the meaning of the logo.  Yellow symbolizes service - they are encouraged to wear the t-shirts during service opportunities.

              
              Christmas Devotional Dinner

Practicing for the Christmas Devotional program

President and Sister Rasmussen lovingly deliver Christmas Eve delivered packages to the missionaries on Saturday

This picture doesn't due justice to how packed to the brim their vehicle was!  Thank you President and Sister Rasmussen for your great love for each of our missionaries!










Christmas Day our missionaries each enjoyed seeing and talking to loved ones at various locations and members homes throughout the mission.

President and Sister Rasmussen didn't forget about the Senior Missionaries ...

We enjoyed a delicious turkey dinner at the mission home on Christmas Day!  We love our Senior Missionaries and appreciate all they do to support and help our mission in so many ways!

A HAPPY NEW YEAR !!!

Our name on our Mission Office door has had a damaged letter "T" in Latter-Day Saints - it was half gone.  Elder Samuels decided to make a sticker letter to provide a temporary fix.  It looks great!!
Thanks Elder!!