Sister Ripplinger's Weekly Letter, Sept. 10, 2012

From: Heather Ripplinger <heather.ripplinger@myldsmail.net>
To: Nikki Ripplinger <bnripp@yahoo.com>; nauvoo president <nauvoopresident@gmail.com>
Sent: Monday, September 10, 2012 11:37 AM
Subject: The Final Four....Weeks

My dear friends and family,

Life in Nauvoo is absolutely wonderful right now!!!!! The sky is a piercing blue color today-not a cloud in the sky. The temperature is PERFECT!!! There are four weeks left until we fly out of the St. Louis airport to our new missions. We had transfers last night and the verdict is..... drum roll.... I get to keep my beautiful Sister Christensen!!!!!!!!!!!!!! =) I was so incredibly happy to be able to stay with her for one last transfer before she goes home. She has a heart of gold and she is so loving. She is a great leader and I absolutely LOVE spending time with her. She's the kind of person that just does what she knows is right and doesn't judge others. Just because of who she is, she inspires me to be better and better. I LOVE HER!!!!! She is one that I know I will be friends with forever and ever. 

I feel like I've progressed into the Advanced Missionary Training Center. =) Each night, we have role play teaching appointments with the senior missionaries. They have been assigned a specific role to play and we get to teach them the main missionary lessons. Each night, we have a different temporary companion that we go to dinner with and teach two lessons. I am learning SOOO much from these experiences! First, it is really good practice to be able to teach with all types of different personalities. Every night, I'm with a different sister, so I get to learn from them! Everyone contributes different strengths. One sister comes from a family where her dad isn't a member of the Church and she and her mom are converts. She can relate to the investigators because she's been there before. Another sister absolutely loves and adores her family and has an incredible gift to be able to testify of Heavenly Father's love. Each one of the sisters here has special and unique qualities that I'm striving to learn from so that I can relate to the people that the Lord has been preparing. Of course, I am learning sooo much from the senior missionaries. They are all absolutely incredible, jam packed full of knowledge and experience....try to outsmart one of them! =) But it is very helpful to teach them because it makes me recognize what is important to include in the lesson and what's not. Sometimes it makes me chuckle because here we are, these young missionaries...teaching former bishops, stake presidents, mission presidents, Relief Society presidents, faithful members of the Church, and people that have worked in the Church Educational System  their entire lives. Needless to say, I'm studying my heart out. The gospel really is so simple, and yet we can study diligently our entire lives, and still keep learning and progressing. I LOVE IT!!!! During one of our lessons, the woman (Sister Green) came out with a ROOT beer bottle that looked like a big, brown bottle of beer. hahahaha I love it when my dear friends take the role on completely and ham it up!!!! Of course, we knew that it wasn't a real bottle and we just have to keep going, even though I want to laugh. =) 

One night I was with Sister Dransfield, and she had just had surgery on her poor mouth. We didn't have a dinner appointment because we were greeting for the evening show, so we went back to the house for dinner. She had an ice pack on her face and I could tell she was hurting. We made some tomato soup and toast, and I realized how much I love the little moments. I love Sister Dransfield and her darling personality and I loved just eating a bowl of soup with her. =) 

I am also realizing how this mission is preparing me for my future life, not just life as a missionary. We get to eat dinner with temple missionaries some nights and they are gushing with gospel knowledge. I LOVE it when they share insights about the temple. Elder Cook shared a scripture in Micah 4:2-3. As he read the scriptures, the Spirit taught me how that related to the temple, and I felt like a little bit of heaven split open. It was sooo neat! The temples are packed full of symbolism. The temples are built (Let us go up to the mountain of the Lord) and people flow to them. "And He will teach us of His ways, and we will walk in His paths..." 

Elder Flake was a mission president in Australia and shared with us some things he taught his missionaries. He'd take an empty frame up and ask them what they saw. Well...they didn't see a picture of anyone in the empty frame. He taught how their spouses and children exist, but they just aren't in the picture yet. We need to serve our missions with all our hearts and then the frame will be filled in when the time is right. Our family members exist, we just don't know who they are yet. =) I thought it was so cute! Some of the sisters were gagging because it was "too much for them"...hahahaha but Sister Dransfield and I thoroughly loved it. =) I love hearing from the senior missionaries- they are so wise! 

Elder Aulestia is someone that I admire a lot. He is a good, good man. He served as a mission president in Peru and I just feel his goodness radiating from him. He shared his conversion story with me, which I absolutely LOVED. When he was 18 years old, he saw a bunch of smiling people walking into an LDS church house, so he went in to see what was going on. He walked in, looked around, and no one stopped him. He walked on out and no one said anything. 15 years later, two elders started teaching him the missionary lessons. He listened, but refused to do anything else. He went through several sets of elders and heard the lessons several times- well enough that he knew them by heart. Years later, a new elder, fresh out of the MTC came into town. The two elders that were serving in the area asked James (Elder Aulestia) if he would mind accompanying this new elder for teaching appointments. =) (I just started smiling at this part of the story...) James agreed to go with this annoying young elder on the agreement that only the Elder would teach and James could be completely silent. So... of course this poor little guy needed some help. And the Lord knew what James needed. Elder asks if James can please help him and share the First Vision. James is annoyed and says that he isn't even a missionary and he knows the darn lesson! James speaks up and shares the First Vision. Then he asks the investigator, "Do you actually believe this story?!" The man anxiously nodded his head and said that he did. James looked the man in the eyes and knew that he really did believe it. He got mad and left in a hurry. The same thing happens a few times- he gets to basically testify of Joseph Smith and the people believe it. He is shocked and tells the other elders to never come to his house again. A week later, the PROPHET was in town. The phone rings and it's the elders. Long story short, James and his family went to the stake center to meet the prophet, the kids LOVED the prophet, James left angrily, and the stake president stopped him on his way out the door. The look in that stake president's eyes convinced James. James got baptized and years later, he is Elder Aulestia- a former mission president and a current missionary in Nauvoo. He's an incredible man. Who woulda thought? =) 

Elder Aulestia taught me some things that he taught his missionaries in Peru. A good missionary doesn't think BAPTISM, she thinks TEMPLE. A good missionary teaches them to get to the temple and receive those ordinances. She also watches for strong families in the ward to fellowship the investigators and pairs them up according to needs and commonalities. Exact obedience is absolutely key. 

I am soaking up these last few weeks. We serve on the Visitor's Center main floor for about 1 1/2 hours and call the rest of the day. Then we have dinner and teaching appointments with the seniors after 6:00. I set a goal to read True to the Faith, the Bible Dictionary, finish reading the Book of Mormon again, and to write in more apostle and prophet quotes into my scriptures according to topic before we leave in October. I LOVE being a missionary!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! 

Family and friends... I love you! Thank you for your love and support! I find so much strength from all of you! 

Love,

Sister Heather Ripplinger