"Love is the motive..." :)

Hey Everyone!! :)

How are you all?? i hope GREAT!! :) Well it has been another great week here in the 'OK!' :) ha and great things have happened! We've found amazing people and have had a lot of great people to teach! What a blessing! Going along with the title of this email "Love is the Motive.." is one of the Mission Values (that i talked about last week) and has been the inspiration for this past week! It's really cool as i was reflecting on the past weeks that i've been here i noticed that each week i've been applying/focusing on one of the mission values! :) like the first couple weeks we were focused a ton on Faith! because without faith miracles can't happen! Last transfer this area was a little slower i heard so we definitely needed some miracles so we tried to exercise our faith as much as we could and LOOK at alllll Heavenly Father has blessed us with?!! Incredible!! i love miracles!! :) The next week we focused a lot more on the Spirit and how it is tRULy the only way people will become converted to the gospel of Jesus Christ is if we live worthy of and allow the Spirit to work, guide, speak, and teach through us! :) The following week (last email) i was focused on Obedience and trying to be more exactly obedient and realized how if we 'pay the price' of obedience the Lord will and truly does bless us immensley!! :) And now this past week I've been focused on loving the people and striving to "listen with love." Elder Holland says, "As we listen with love we won't have to worry about what to say next because the Spirit will fill our minds with what to say." That is so true! And i like listening with love and letting the Spirit teach through me instead of me trying to listen but at the same time try and come up with what i can teach them or what i'm goin to say next. Love truly is the motive! Without love for my Heavenly Father, Savior, the gospel, and His children there is NO WAY i would be out here doing this!! :) So this week we were blessed with 3 miracles that i want to tell you about! 1. Travis 2. Nancy 3. Katelynn :) So, one night Sister Draper and i were out trying to visit a referral but she wasn't home so while we were on the porch a guy (like 20-ish) was walking by and asked us what we were doing? (great question us missionaries love! :) ha) So of course we walked up to him and told him and then found out he was out selling children's books and stuff! We taught him a few things about the gospel and what we believe and gave him a Book of Mormon and told him how much it would bless his life if he read it etc. and he accepted it and said thanks and he was wAY nice and awesome! it was sO cool how the Lord just "randomly" (and when i say 'randomly' i mean 'heavenly father's "on purpose" ha) placed him in our path at that time! He was a really cool guy and fun to talk to but he moves around from state to state selling so we weren't able to really get contact info or continue to teach him but at least we planted that seed! :) 2. Nancy, oh my goodness i LOVE this lady!! :) what an incredible person!! We were out tracting and came to her house and she was SOOO nice and let us in and thought her "Mormon friends" (from the other ward we found out) had sent us! ha but those ones hadn't! it was crazy and she was sOO open and excited to listen to us and have us teach her! She was raised a Jehovahs' witness (50 years) and was never willing to listen to missionaries but explained to us how much it meant to her we had stopped by and that she can see the light her friends and us have about us and love our 'demeanors' and said that she wants what we have! it was incredible!! i couldn't believe all the kind things she said and i thought that it is people like HER that make it WORTH going out and doing what we do as missionaries! :) Love truly is the motive! :) She is the cutest and sweetest lady ever and i can't wait to go back to teach her! :) 3. Katelynn- oh my goodness this girl is the cutest girl ever! she's 11 and had a baptismal date and everything Last transfer! She was all set to get baptized but then was out of town for a weekend or two and then they could never get in contact with her again! When i got here we tried to go visit (because their phones stopped working) but they have a big gate and HUGE dog and stuff so we can't get up to their house! it was so crazy and discouraging because we were so close but they never knew we were there! UNTIL.. this past week we decided to try going there for the 3rd time! ha we prayed and once we got there (in the middle of nowhere) we stood outside the gate and just starting yelling out their names! haha we probably looked really funny ESPECiALLY when the HUGE dog decided to come out of nowhere and start barking at us!! hah I was a little scared because it could easily jump the fence if it wanted to and probably eat us! hah i'm so glad it didn't though! Cause then we all of a sudden saw a man walking out and he came up and talked to us! It was katelynn's grandpa! (who had heard the dog barking and had just woken up from a nap and was only home at that time -middle of the day- because he'd gone to the dentist so he was home from work!) He was sOOO nice and told us what happned with the phones and that she should be home from school soon and that they had been trying to come to church but something always came up! So needless to say we waited till she got home and were able to see and talk to her! She is still loving the Book of Mormon and the gospel and is just so cute and sweet!! MIRACLE!!! I can't wait to teach her and see how everything is going! :) So those were some of the amazing miracles of the week!! We also went to Moore (OKC) on Wed. for a "New Missionary/Trainer Meeting" which was way fun and good too! :) it's always fun to see the other missionaries and hear their AWESOmE and AMAzING stories!! it's definitely motivating and uplifting! Missionary Work is AMAZING!!! such a work of miracles!! :) i love it! Friday, we met with a TON of our Investigators which was Awesome! i love meeting with them and helping them learn more about the restored gospel that is here on earth in these latter-days!! what a trememdous blessing and miracle in itself!! :D i love it!! Well, pretty sure this email is long enough-prob way too long!! hah but thank you ALL for the amazing letters, love, support, prayers, and encouragement!! i love it!! and i love you all sOOO much!! :) Whenever i hear from you it seriously mAKEs my dAY!! so thank you!! :) And if you haven't heard back from me yet just know i'm workin' on it! i really wish we had more time to write letters than just once a week! ha but it's all good! i love writing them!! :) I hope everyone has a Happy Valentines Day tomorrow!! And remember that the greatest gift given to us (Christ's Atonement) was a gift out of lOVE! Make "love your motive" and go tell and show the people you love that you love them!! :) (What better day to start than on V-day~the day of love?! hah) Have a great week!! Love and miss you all!!! :)

Love, Sister Carlini

ps. *Quote of the Week: "What we love deteremines what we seek; what we seek determines what we think and do; what we think and do determines who we are and who we will become." -Pres. Uchtdorf :)

 

 

pps. Here are some pic descriptions (i'll try and start describin them each week sorry i didn't before since i sent WAY too many!! :) hah) so the first one "HairIDo' license plate.. pretty awesome right?! i new i was sent to Oklahoma for a reason! ;) ha second pic, one of the members in our ward has a bunch of horses so fun huh? Oh my goodness the plate of food!! crazy huh?! We went to a members house for dinner and this is what they brought out to us! It was like restaurant style! way good! :) the Woman at the Well pic with the quote is on our door and our new mission motto that i love! :) the next one with me is outside last night with the sNOW!! it finally snowed last night and everyone here cracks me up cause they can't drive in it (since they aren't use to it or getting snow) so they will like buy extra food and get all stocked up when they hear that a 'snow storm' is coming in :) so awesome oh i just love Oklahoma! :) I really shouldn't be talking though cuz i KNOW i'm goin to FLIP OUT when it's tornado season!! ha and it's like no big deal to them :) ha the last pics are more pics of the apartment/living room! Our bishop just got us new couches so woo hoo! Have a great day! :)